#if it's not too obvious... that thing Frisk had mentioned before

[akanemnon]

The power of pep talks (kinda) shines within you

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MASTERPOST (for the full series / FAQ / reference sheets)

#deltarune #undertale #crossover #crossover comic #utdr #deltarune fanart #undertale fanart #twin runes #twin runes comic #my art #kris dreemurr #frisk #and here we have the moment where their bond really solidifies #also if you'reading the tags #if it's not too obvious... that thing Frisk had mentioned before #about the whole feeling what Kris is feeling #the same is the case the other way around #just pointing that out

[shimmershy]

There's Only One Thing Left to Say, This Time (Undertale Fanfic)

New fanfic time! When I started writing this, I got the idea mostly because 1. I've been having trouble "moving on" from things in my own life recently and wanted to try processing it through fic and 2. it was the end of the school year for me and I had been saying a lot of goodbyes, so it felt thematically relevant. I wrote almost the entire thing impulsively at like three am a couple weeks ago and really impressed myself lol.

Chara Week Day 7: Free (I know it's over, but shhhh it still counts)

Summary:

You're having trouble saying goodbye, but the thing is that you don't have to! If you keep Resetting just before it's all over, you'll never have to be by yourself again. Right? You haven't known them long, and maybe they weren't super nice at the start, but they were there for you every step of the way. They listened to you and helped you when no one else would. You can't just let them disappear… You can't. ...But you can't keep doing this forever, Frisk. You have to let me go.

Characters: Chara and Frisk

Word count: 4,763 words

(Ao3 link in reblog!)

There's only one thing left to say this time,

I hope you're fine, goodbye.

– “Goodbye” by The Altogether

It isn’t until the third True Reset that I realize what this is all about, and when I do, I feel silly for not realizing it before.

I can still feel the way the bitterness worked its way under my skin the first time you brought everyone back. Which, is actually quite impressive on your part! Seeing as I don’t have skin anymore. I suppose it worked its way under your skin, then, because you wouldn’t stop apologizing to me in your head as you made your way through the Ruins. I should have been the one apologizing to you, Frisk. It’s no business of mine what you do with your own life, and you have no business feeling my emotions for me. This connection we have can be troubling, at times.

Still, it felt like a betrayal, and you offered me no explanation, so I could not understand.

I understood a little better when you decided to stay with Toriel for a while. Despite my obvious frustration and impatience, you sat and listened to her snail facts. You let her show you that bug-hunting spot she mentioned, and you spent time helping her run errands and letting her teach you how to cook. You even got to the point where she started giving you classes, as if you planned on staying. I assumed it was sentimentality, then. Perhaps there was something about the Underground that you didn’t want to leave behind. Maybe you weren’t ready to go back to living on the surface just yet. It’s not as if I could blame you for that one.

What I didn’t notice (and what I am noticing now), was how much attention you were giving me. And well, it’s not that I didn’t notice. I was just too busy being annoyed about it, and rightfully so. Can’t the narrator of your life narrate in peace? I do not care for superfluous conversation. And that’s not even the worst of it. Frisk, you should not be so casual about sharing control of your body, That’s like, the one thing you should never have to share. Sure, it happened one time, but I only stepped in because you were so afraid, and I didn’t even realize it was happening until it was me that the spears were getting shot at. That’s different. I will not take control of your body just to eat a slice of pie. Your pity for me is insulting.

What’s troubling is that it doesn't seem to be going away.

You take your first shivering step into Snowdin (for the fourth time, I can’t help but note) without so much as a glance behind you. This time, you left Toriel with no hesitation, and I know it’s because you know I didn’t want to stay. You’re not even trying to hide it. This is when I finally decide it’s time to confront you.

What are you doing? I ask.

“I’m…walking?” you respond, confused, through thoughts. Your boots crunch satisfyingly through the snow to prove your point. Crunch, crunch, crunch. I huff in frustration.

Frisk. Why do you keep Resetting?

This stops you (and your crunchy boots) in your tracks, and suddenly I can feel anxiety radiating off of you. You weren’t expecting me to ask you this directly.

When you don’t respond, I continue, a little bit of venom coating my words despite my best efforts. For the third time now, you have made it to the end, broken the barrier, only to start all over again. Do you not feel even the slightest bit of remorse?

“Of course I feel bad!” you’re quick to say, as if you’re surprised I would assume otherwise. “But…we’ll still get there again in the end; it’s not that big a deal.”

That’s a horrible excuse.

“Why’re you so angry about it?” Your voice comes out sharp in the frigid air.

Why are you so stubborn?

“What’re you even talking about?!”

You’re trying to delay the inevitable.

You’re about to debate me on that, too, in a defensive way rather than a genuinely angry way. But you stop, because you suddenly understand that I understand, and the anxiety returns. You continue walking after a brief hesitation.

Goodbyes are never easy, I say, as gently as I can. (It ends up sounding forced anyway.)

You ignore me, and I allow you to.

~~~

What are you going to do once you get back to the surface? Once you decide to stay?

You’ve made it to Waterfall at this point, having made it through Snowdin without much event. You’re getting a little tired of doing the same thing every time; I can tell, but you would never admit to it.

You kick a stone on the ground, watching as it disappears into the dark grass. “I dunno.” (“I dunno-”) (“-dunno-”)

Your own voice travels around you in echoes and fragments. You really shouldn’t talk out loud like this in the middle of all these echo flowers. Number one, it’s annoying, and that should be reason enough, but number two, you shouldn’t make a habit of talking out loud to the voice in your head at all. People are going to think you’re weird. And I mean, you’re already pretty weird, but do you really want the reputation of “the weird kid who talks to themself” stuck to you even after I’m gone?

I didn’t even realize you were listening to all that, but you flinch at that last part, not only mentally but physically too, and I try to ignore the fact that you’re proving my point.

I hum thoughtfully. You “don’t know”? That’s certainly an issue then, isn’t it?

You start to fidget with the hem of your sweater and return to talking to me through thoughts, much to my relief. “I just haven’t thought much about it.”

This is a lie. But I don’t point that out to you.

You’re in a part of Waterfall that you’ve never seen before. Admittedly, it’s not much different to the parts you have seen before, but the fact that it’s new at all is good enough for you. You’re trying to explore the area as much as you can this time around, because you’ve realized just how expansive Waterfall really is and the curiosity you came here with the first time still hasn’t left you. You’ve barely seen a fraction of the place, and you definitely won’t manage to see all of it, but you’re certainly going to try.

I might take this time to remind you that no matter how many times you’ve befriended her in the past, Undyne is still hunting you down in this timeline. So maybe taking the time to look at every blade of grass there is to look at isn’t the best idea. But whatever.

There are quite a few echo flowers growing in this area, as I mentioned before. It seems more secluded than the rest of the caverns that make up Waterfall, if that’s even possible. You can see the main path you usually walk from where you’re standing, separated from you by a large expanse of luminescent cyan water, and an overwhelming sense of calm washes over you. It’s like this is a little cove carved out just for you, safe from everything that may hurt you. It’s hard for me not to feel the same sense of calm. Whether it’s just the spilling over of your emotions or completely and entirely mine is hard to tell, but it doesn’t really matter.

Why don’t we sit here for a minute? I ask. You let out a breath and descend to the ground, hugging your knees and resting your head against the rough cavern walls without hesitation, as if you were waiting for me to say just that.

It’s nice to just be here, for me, with you, like this. Together. Your hands are intertwined in the way that I know means you’re trying to hold my hand, in whatever way you can. We look out at the stillness of the water, listening to the sound of rushing waterfalls in the distance. We both must be thinking about the same thing, now, because although I don’t agree with the Resets, I understand why you don’t want to leave, to some extent. Have you convinced me that you’re right? Have I felt this way the entire time and simply didn’t realize until now? I can’t say for certain. But I’m becoming increasingly aware of my own fear of reaching the end.

“Chara?” you say, voice cracking a little. The sound of my name spoken aloud and echoed around by the echo flowers startles me. “It’s just that…I really, really don’t wanna be by myself again.”

I feel tears pricking at your eyes. The honesty in your voice stings.

You won’t be by yourself, I try halfheartedly. Everyone will be up there with you.

You reposition to rest your head on your knees. “You know what I mean,” you whisper, and after a moment you say. “You’re not gonna be there.”

…Right. Of course.

That is the funny thing about good things, see. About journeys and stories. And lives. They end. Sometimes (always) too soon.

I do not know what I was expecting the first time you made it to the surface. What, was I just going to live inside your head forever? Would you want that? Would I? The strangest thing happened when you stepped over that threshold where the barrier once stood, when everyone else followed you out. I felt you pull away from me, and then I watched the back of your head as you walked out into the sun. It was a bit disorienting. I wasn’t seeing through your eyes anymore, I was just…there. Watching. Barely even there, because I couldn't feel you there justifying my existence anymore.

I don’t think there was a doubt in either of our minds about what that meant. As everyone else chatted in awe of how beautiful the sun was, you looked back at me (although I don’t think you really saw me, just the empty opening of the cave). There was confusion, or sadness, or panic on your face. I’ve never had to read your face from the outside before, what a funny thing to realize. Whatever emotion it was, it was enough to make you Reset. And then again, and again. It really was for my sake, then.

This makes me feel a strange mixture of things, but the feeling of guilt sticks out like a sore thumb. Frisk, I don’t want you to feel any sort of…obligation? Or anything? To keep me alive. I’ve been wanting to be dead for a long time.

It’s a lame attempt at humor to lighten the mood, but as soon as I think it, I realize how unfunny it sounds. It kind of stops being a joke when it’s true.

Still, you reply, “It’s not like that. You know that.”

You are making some awfully bold assumptions here, though they’re not entirely false. I’m inclined to ask, what is it like then? Would moving on with your life not be the best option here? Everything is going to work out for you. And, hey, you won’t even have to put up with an annoying ghost in your head anymore.

“What if I like the annoying ghost in my head?”

Well, then you’re weird. But we’ve already established that.

That gets a smile out of you. “See? You always make me feel better,” you think, and I want to roll my eyes at that. I want to remind you of all the times I made you feel worse rather than better, but I stay quiet for now.

“…Before I came here,” you start, eyes trained on the ground as you fidget with the grass there, “I was alone a lot. It wasn’t so bad, but…it wasn’t so good either.” You shrug one of your shoulders. “I dunno. I didn’t think about it much. I had to take care of myself, and there was never anyone there…to say it’d be okay, or to tell me dumb jokes, or just be there…y’know?”

Yeah. I do know.

…

“I kinda panicked when I left the Underground and you weren’t there. You were just…gone, and I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t even really mean to Reset, I just didn’t think, and I-“

You sigh.

“I just really care about you. You’re like my best friend, Chara- ‘N that’s what it’s like. It’s like saying goodbye to your best friend.”

Oh.

Ha ha. Yes, I really do know that, don’t I?

“Wait, augh. I-I probably shouldn’t’ve said it like that, I’m sorry-“

No, Frisk, there is no need to apologize. It is fine. It’s fine.

Your fingernails claw into the grass and the dirt beneath.

I know. I know what you mean. I really do.

I try not to think of my brother. I fail.

I did not think you would care so much. It’s- (stupid), I want to say, but you are not stupid. (See, caring about me always gets people hurt), I want to say, but that’s not your fault. (What did you expect?), I want to say. (I don’t believe you), I want to say. (I don’t understand you), I want to say. I can’t- I can’t say any of that. I can’t say anything to you, right now.

You- you nod, a little concerned, but you give me space. You bring your hands together again and gaze out at the water again for a minute. Then, finally, you decide to continue onwards. You have a fish monster to face.

~~~

Being here doesn’t get easier, no matter how prepared I am after each Reset. The grey, achromatic walls and floors. The feeling of despair in the air. The stillness. It directly contrasts my memories of warmth and color and love in this home. It reminds me too much of dust.

I stay quiet as you kneel in front of the save star. It glows in a steady, consistent way, light flowing out from the center and disintegrating at the edges. A comforting feeling washes over you, as it always does, and you step into the house.

It’s as lonely as ever. You should just get this over with. The monsters that are always here to greet you at this phase of your journey stop you on your way to the kitchen.

“A long time ago, a human fell into the Ruins,” one of the Froggits begins. You stand there with your hands clasped together and listen politely, as you always do. I put up a mental barrier between myself and the world and try not to listen, as I always do.

The key on the kitchen countertop glints in the other room. You wait for the Froggits to finish speaking before grabbing it and returning to the hallway. You make your way to the far end of the hall to grab the second key, too, before entering my old room.

You open the gift boxes and take the locket and dagger out without a word. I relish the familiar weight around your neck as you reach back to fasten the locket’s clasp. It helps me find the words I want to say.

Frisk. I don’t want to keep doing this.

You’re surprised to hear me speak, but you listen.

What we talked about earlier… It’s not that I don’t want to stay. I think…you’ve helped me a lot too. And I’m really glad I met you. I’m just tired of feeling stuck in the past. A part of me…wants that, but. It hurts, being here but not being able to do anything. To fix anything.

Plus, I mean. You!! The barrier’s broken thanks to you! You and…Asriel, of course. At least, it will be. Again. It’s… I’m glad it worked out in the end. Even if it took a really long time.

I wish things could be different. I wish I could stay, at least a little longer, but I don’t want to take this away from them. Or from you. I made my choice a long time ago, and this is already more than I deserve.

…

Are you…crying?

You’re holding your arms around yourself, as well. What is this???

“A hug,” you say through thoughts, sniffling.

Oh.

“I’m sorry for making you feel like that.”

It’s not your fault.

“I shouldn’t’ve kept Resetting, though. I knew it upset you the first time…”

I understand why you did it now, though. It’s okay, really.

“Okay…”

You rub your eyes with your sleeve and stand up, giving yourself a self-assured nod.

“Don’t worry. This will be the last time.”

~~~

When it’s time to fight Asriel, we’re both filled with determination. The nothingness surrounding us erupts in color and light, illuminated by kaleidoscopic starbeams and glimmering stardust. Attacks rain down on you from above, and you weave your body between them masterfully. You can’t evade them all, but I’m there cheering you on. A blast from Shocker Breaker shatters your soul; I reach out to press the pieces back together. But it refused!

Asriel floats above you, smirking with confidence in his power. You aren’t afraid of him anymore. You know all too well what he’s capable of, but you know him better now than you did when you first encountered him, just a human and a flower with a million untold secrets between them. He’d laid all his puzzle pieces out before you, and you can’t help but see the whole painful picture before you now. He’s stuck in a cycle, much like you but nothing like you at all. You’re going to help him bring it to an end. (Once and for all.)

The attacks keep coming, but you persist. You reach out to your friends within Asriel’s soul and remind them of who they are. Undyne, whom you admire for her enthusiasm and sense of justice. Alphys, whose intelligence and desire to do better inspire you. Papyrus, whom you enjoy hanging out with for his optimism and dedication. Sans, who tells you jokes that make you laugh and whose laid-back attitude puts you at ease. Toriel, who cares for you as her own child and made you feel safe when you first found yourself in this unfamiliar place. Asgore, whose presence is both comforting and sad, knowing of the difficult decisions he’s had to make in his life. Once you’ve reached out to all your friends, there’s only one thing left to do.

It seems that there’s still one last person that needs to be saved.

So you reach out to Asriel. And I do, too. He’s not the same as he was all those years ago, when we were just two kids playing in a muddy flower garden, and neither am I. But it’s still him, despite everything. He resists…and he’s still crying out to you as if you’re me. It hurts. I watch him do this every time, desperately latch on to the belief that I’m not really gone, and the ironic thing is that I have been here the whole time.

“I’m not ready for this to end,” he says, confident façade cracking.

It ended a long time ago.

“I’m not ready for you to leave,” he says.

I know.

“I’m not ready to say goodbye to someone like you again…”

…

“So, please…” His voice shakes, laced with despair. “Stop doing this… And just let me win!!!”

He raises his arms and summons all his magic for one final attack. Your vision is overwhelmed with color as the blast hits you, and you barely register the way he screams at you to stop holding on as your HP drops, with each passing second, to an impossibly low number. But it never reaches zero. You don’t die; your soul doesn’t shatter, because you’ve made it this far and you’re not about to give up now.

Finally, the world grows silent as the sound of magic rushing past your ears subsides. You’re exhausted, though Asriel is barely even paying attention to you anymore. He closes his eyes. Suddenly he seems so small inside his godlike form, too small to really be the Absolute God of HYPERDEATH.

“I’m so alone, Chara…” he says. “I’m so afraid…” They’re echoes of words I’ve already heard him say three times before, but they feel like acid nonetheless because it’s my fault and I’m the reason he’s like this, but you firmly tell me that it’s not. I don’t know if I can believe you, but I lean into you and try not to say anything more.

…

The world fades to black, and Asriel stands before you, looking the way I remember him once again. He’s covering his face, wiping away his tears and probably trying to hide the fact that he’s crying, too. He always was a crybaby, wasn’t he?

“I always was a crybaby, wasn’t I, Chara?”

Ha. Indeed.

He pauses for a moment, a thoughtful expression on his face. “…I know. You’re not actually Chara, are you? Chara’s been gone for a long time.”

You open your mouth to protest, but… Come on, Frisk, I can’t do that to him. Not after all that.

“But… Are you sure?”

I’m not… I am not here to stay. It would be a mistake to get his hopes up.

You twist your fingers together, disappointed, but you close your mouth anyway.

I’m only half-listening as he continues, asking for your name (which you have given him three times already) and apologizing for his actions. This is the last time I’m going to see him, is it not? He will break the barrier, and then you will go to the surface with everyone else. And I… Well, I don’t actually know what will happen to me. I won’t be able to come with you. I know that, at the very least. It looks like it might really be the end for me. I don’t know how to feel about that.

You tell him you forgive him, as you do every time. It seems only fair to you, after everything he’s gone through. A part of you understands him, even though most of you doesn’t, and you hope the knowledge that somebody in the universe forgives him gives him some solace. He smiles at you sadly.

He can’t stay, he tells you. With a deep breath, he closes his eyes in concentration. The human souls gather around him as he rises into the air, hovering around him in a circle, and the monster souls follow suit, glowing in the darkness. With the combined power of the human souls and every monster soul in the Underground, each pulsing with the same desire…the barrier is finally broken.

It’s over. There’s a weighty sense of resolution to it now. I don’t want you to Reset again. I know you won’t.

I stare at Asriel through your eyes as he lowers to the ground again, head tilted down, eyes closed. He looks so tired. He tells you that he needs to go, that you should go be with the people that care about you. You should just forget about him, he says. As if that would be possible.

Every word feels like a countdown, and I want to do something, but I can’t move. I need him to forget about me. I can’t be here messing everything up. I don’t…want him to forget me. But I don’t want him to hurt remembering me. I don’t want to stay here… I don’t want to go.

You hug Asriel. To my surprise, your arms tighten around him as you allow me to slip into control. “Just for a minute,” you think. The feeling of warmth and his sweater under my fingers and my chin on his shoulder hits me so suddenly that I can’t stop my tears from running down your face. I relax into the hug, though. I close my eyes and try to forget where we are and what we’ve been through. I don’t want to let go…

When he finally pulls away, he gives me a weird look, but it’s gone in a moment.

“I’ll miss you,” I say without thinking.

He laughs. “Please don’t.”

And just like that, he’s gone again.

“You okay?” you ask as you slip back into control. Your presence is comforting beside mine in your mind.

I am, I say. Yeah.

~~~

Outside, clouds drift lazily across the sky, a beautiful gradient from lilac to yellow to frame the setting sun. Over the edge of the mountainside, you can just barely see the tops of trees stretching out into the distance, leaves tousling gently in the breeze. Tall buildings silhouette the sky on one side, and on the other, more mountains.

The light streams in through the exit to the Underground, of which you stand behind. One of your hands is cupped over the other in front of you, and you run your fingertips over the knuckles absently. You have been standing here for a while, hesitant.

Congratulations, partner, I start in an attempt to ease the tension, you’ve saved everyone once again.

“We did,” you correct. “And Asriel.”

Of course. And now, think about it. Everyone is free for real. They can see the sun, the sky, the stars… There’s a whole future ahead of them. And you get to be a part of it. That’s amazing, is it not?

“Mhm…”

You could stay with Mom. She would make you breakfast in the morning, read you bedtime stories at night. I bet Undyne would be willing to teach you some sick fighting moves. Anime nights with Alphys.

“I could hang out with Sans and Papyrus.”

Yeah! You could learn how to make music with Napstablook. That might be fun. And Mettaton might need some help becoming a star on the surface, too.

You giggle. “I think he’s got that covered.”

Maybe. I smile along with you. But, aren’t you excited? Not everything will be easy, but you have so many people supporting you.

“I know…” You sigh through your nose. “You deserve all that too, though; it’s not fair.”

Hey. The lilac is disintegrating from the sky, fading into a deep orange. Some of the wind makes it into the cave, crisp air whistling through the doorway and cooling your skin. Hey, you know what? It’s worth it. It’s okay.

I think there are tears in your eyes again. Come on, please don’t cry.

I can’t stay here forever. I’m already overstaying my welcome, being dead and all. I was supposed to be gone a long time ago, but…I got to meet you by some miracle, and that makes it all worth it, I think. Even if I can’t stay.

“Charaaa…”

I laugh a little. Don’t worry about me, Frisk. Really. I couldn’t have asked for anything more.

You hug yourself- “Hug you,” you correct. Oh. Okay. You hug me, and I, try to hug you back? It’s a little bit awkward, but I appreciate it all the same. The emotional vulnerability is starting to make me uncomfortable, but I need you to know I care about you. I know you’ll be okay.

Ha ha, this goodbye stuff is pretty hard, huh?

“Goodbye,” you say simply, with a teasing smile.

Oh, not so hard for you, it seems. Well then, “goodbye” to you, too.

I pause. …And good luck out there, partner. I think Asriel said it best: take care of everyone for me, okay? Even him.

You nod and give me a shaky little thumbs up. That’s the spirit! (Pun always intended.)

With a glance over to the others, who are in the other room, chatting amongst themselves and waiting for you, you decide you’re finally ready to go. You let everyone know, and the excitement in the room is palpable as you all make your way to the exit. They make a fuss out of you, ruffling your hair and smiling back at you. You let them leave first, and then at last, you step over the threshold yourself. I feel our connection sever.

And then I’m watching the back of your head as you walk away again. Before you reach the others though, you turn around to give me a small wave.

That’s it, I guess… I can’t exactly wave back, but I wish you well and thank you for everything. Together, you and I allow time to continue on.

#chara week #chara week 2023 #they're not in the cover art but the fic is mostly about them and Frisk so #undertale #safeutdr #chara dreemurr #frisk dreemurr #fanfiction #undertale fanfiction #fanfic #my writing #my art #chara #frisk #undertale frisk #undertale chara #🌼 #also in reference to what I wrote at the beginning of the post. I wrote that a couple weeks ago. when I THOUGHT I would finish this #but of course I procrastinated on writing the last scenes so now I'm posting it quite a bit after the school year ended. oh well #still thematically relevant #writing is hard for me /except/ when I impulsively write at 3am and realize I've gotten to 2000 words without really trying. apparently. :I #also as a sidenote. this is just a one-off 'what if' scenario for me because the idea of chara not being able to come with frisk to #the surface makes me sad so. :( #sidenote number two. HOW did this become longer than Thunderstorms dude....... that was not intentional.

[rainesntears]

The TRUE Meaning Behind "spr_ourheart".

(Reddit Mirror) There's been a HUGE debate in the UT/DR community about the meaning of the sprite "ourheart". In order to decipher the true meaning behind this I'm going to be looking at lore and the files to get what I consider to be the most accurate explanation. So without further a do let us begin!

What Is "spr_ourheart"?

Before we can analyze this sprite and its potential implications we first have to examine what it is. "spr_ourheart" is the name of the sprite for Frisks soul during the Photoshop Flowey battle. The file looks like this.

The point of debate comes to discussing who the "our" is referring to, which is the topic we'll be covering next.

Who Are The Other People Involved With The Heart?

Of course this raises the question, who is the "our" referring to? Well first we can deduce that Frisk is most likely the one naming this file, as they're seen naming other files as well, such as the ones for their room.

So this means that we're dealing with Frisk and outside forces/an outside force. Many peoples first assumption here would be someone like Chara or The Player. I mean thats reasonable, Frisk has some form of a connection to them in most interpretations. So what exactly is wrong with these takes? Well as previously mentioned the "ourheart" sprite only appears during the Photoshop Flowey battle. Normally this sprite would be named "spr_heart". 

So why exactly does the sprite name change for solely this fight? Well it may not be obvious at first but there is a reasonable answer to this question! To explain this lets take a look at a unique circumstance present during the Photoshop Flowey fight.

Yep! You guessed it! The segment right before Finale, the one where the souls rebel and help you. This explains the use of "our" in the sprite name and why its a unique case for just this fight! I know what you're thinking, "but there's no way to prove this, right?". Wellll... you'd be wrong about this. The red soul isnt the only file name to change specifically in reference to this fight. The other souls have regular sprites too that are later renamed for the fight too. Take a look! 

The aqua and orange souls even have unused variants for this too! 

So those were the normal sprites, and guess what they change to during the Photoshop Flowey battle? 

Yep! They do indeed change for the fight. This was likely so Toby had a way to keep track of the variations needed for the Photoshop Flowey encounter and not get them mixed up with the regular versions. This newfound logic is also just as applicable to "ourheart".

Closing Thoughts

In the end the conclusion I think we've reached is that "ourheart" is solely a change in file name for convenience on Tobys end. Now I do want to make it clear that this post isnt meant to directly be Anti-Narrachara or Anti-Player, it's supposed to point out that using "ourheart" as evidence for theories of that caliber isnt all that useful considering its context. I suppose what I'm trying to say is you're allowed to believe what you want but context does matter, especially when we're dealing with things like file names, which tend to be vague. With that said I hope you enjoyed and I'll see you another time for a different theory post!

#undertale #ut #deltarune #dr #undertale lore #ut lore #deltarune lore #dr lore #undertale theory #ut theory #deltarune theory #dr theory

[frisiunia]

Humans' situation

So there are few things I need to explain in Undermourning. So here we go (it's gonna be very, very long ;)):

How does twins (and other humans) move between the Ruins and the rest of the Underground?

That's the first thing. So twins' tactic isn't anything complicated actually.

At first they did it when Toriel wasn't in the house. They would only leave a note for Toriel with some excuse about their absence. They also had Flowey by their side and he could easily check if it's safe for them to come back without Toriel noticing where are they coming back from.

However they couldn't always wait for Toriel to leave. So tactic they're using most often is: Natalie, who is more likely to leave the Ruins quickly and quietly talks with Toriel (somewhere where stairs aren't in sight) about her and Sofia going somewhere. In the meantime, Sofia is leaving first. Then, after Natalie explained everything to Toriel, she leaves herself. Quickly and quietly. Just in case, Sofia has came up with a few excuses they can use, when they get caught.

After Frisk has fallen into the Underground, twins were thinking for a little while if they can trust eighteen year old with their little secret and show him the rest of the Underground. However, they eventually decided to do it and they didn't regret it. However, they weren't as trusty with next humans who fall in future years. Especially Sunday and Cameron, who aren't the best persons to trust... and live with. However, twins trusted Jayden quite quickly. About Cora, they never showed her the rest of the Underground before the fight, cause they knew that as soon as queen finds out that there's seven humans in the Underground, they're doomed. So twins only explained to her the whole thing.

And how did anyone from the rest of the Underground never find out about them living in the Ruins? ...Who has said nobody knows? Okay, first things first. It's usual thing that a lot of monsters would ask twins about where are they living. However, they would often dismiss those who would ask. Sometimes, when they would know that someone will respect their secrets, like Papyrus, they would say right away to do not ask them about it. They don't like to hide things from their friends, but they also didn't want Toriel to find out and others to find out about Toriel's place.

Did someone try to follow them to find out where they live? There are always some people that would try to solve a mystery, so that's obvious. However, twins, and later other humans who would go by their tips, has their ways to avoid them knowing. Before coming back, they would leave themselves enough time to wander sometime and try to lose themselves from potiential followers' eyes. They would also sometimes come into some places where night could be spend. Usually before coming back to the Ruins, they come into Inn in Snowdin and spends there a while, talking to innkeeper. Then, they usually goes where the trees are densely spaced. What is worth mentioning, when Sofia was trying to help Papyrus get into the Royal Guard, actual bars were set before the Ruins exit. You can say that twins have borrowed one of spare keys to them.

Later thanks to Frisk, twins found out that Undyne and probably people close to the ruler, like the Royal Guard knows where they live and where Toriel lives. So they didn't really care that some of guards would find out, since they've already known. If we're talking about guards, humans rather pretend that they hide it from them. However, they are still careful with other monsters.

War Plans

A good plan is very important part of a war. You can clearly see that studying history. Sofia and Natalie also know that, especially Sofia. When they finally decided that fight is a necessity, they had a problem in establishing their tactic. They both wanted to wait for seven humans to come. However, despite Frisk falling recently, Sofia thought it might take too long. Natalie also become more doubtful about it. So they started thinking about three-persons plans. They and Frisk also have begun training more often.

No human has fallen down for nearly two years. But finally in 2020 Sunday fell into the Underground. That gave twins more hope. But then, another problem had appeared. Other humans' attitude. You see, they noticed that Sunday is not the best person to work with. Even if other humans will fall in the future, what if they'll have same attitude as Sunday? Twins understood they can't just make soldiers that would just listen to them without questioning their orders. So they created general plan, and as another humans were falling, they were updating and adapting it to fit said humans. They also tried to slowly guide these humans into this situation, knowing they may feel uneasy getting thrown into it like that. Twins tried not to let them get to attached to monsters they meant to fight with. Excluding Papyrus to some extent. After all, it's difficult to even imagine Papyrus actually wanting Undyne's plan to happen.

But what plan actually was? Let me show you: In general, taking down Royal Guards and other, loyal to gueen people. Removing queen herself. If someone gives up, they're getting spared. Including queen, though obviously she's probably not going to do that. No civilians are getting hurt, unless they're joining to the battle on queen's side. Toriel's going to become a new queen. But if she refuse or monster don't want her as a queen, they can just choose their ruler.

About roles that were given to humans as plan developed: Frisk is the one that meant to kill Undyne. Natalie mostly takes care of guards in Hotland and then supports Frisk if it's needed. Sofia is the one to take care of guards in Snowdin. Since Cora had no fighting skills or time to train, she supports Sofia, mostly holding food and arrows for her. Cameron and Sunday mostly takes care of Waterfall, while Jayden makes sure they won't hurt anyone else than guards. If someone's work is finished, they can support others. + Flowey makes sure no one tries to enter the Ruins. Ya know, just in case.

Execution

What about execution of this plan?... Well, did you read "Chara" story? In "War Route" part, Chara is talking about how bad others are feeling with it. He mentions that Monster Kid Teen's family is gone, and that Lamef is traumatized. Well, now I think I want to change this dialogue a little, but you get the point, right? Especially with death of MK's family. Civilians also got hurt or even died. Though Jaydan was doing his best, it is mostly Sunday and Cameron's fault. Chara made these two hateful and cruel. He even scripted some events, so even though these two may have some good qualities, they're just forced to act in certain way. Like killing MK's family is scripted. It happens always in this route. However, he doesn't have to script so many things so this route would be unhappy enough for Frisk to reset.

That's all for today. It was long, I know. And yet, I think I could tell ya about few more things. Welp. Maybe some other time. For now, bye!

#undertale #undertaleau #undertale au #undermourning #chara #frisk #undyne #flowey #toriel #papyrus

[the-unrelated-theorist]

Bargaining Chip

I mentioned this on a former blog which I deleted due to severe depression, but I wanna mention it again because I feel like it’s an important point that is often overlooked.  So if you’ve seen this before, understand that I’m not intentionally plagiarizing anyone but myself.

Why did Flowey destroy Asgore’s SOUL instead of giving it to Chara?  It’s obvious from the very fact that he killed his own father that he’s still not above murder.  But he could have handed the SOUL over to Chara as a bargaining chip.  “S-see, Chara?  I’m- I’m on YOUR side, this time!  I helped you!  I-I wasn’t warning him, honest, I wasn’t!  I was tricking him, I was luring him into a trap!  I killed that old fool, an-and here’s his SOUL!  Now you can go through the barrier anytime you want!  Just, p-please d-don’t k-kill m-m-me!”

It wouldn’t have worked, of course.  Chara was too Determined to let anyone live.  But if Flowey was truly only interested in his own survival at this point, why not give it a try, anyway?  He was gonna wind up dead either way, why not do the smart thing?  (I’m not defending him, I’m pointing out why his decision doesn’t match up with a selfish survival instinct.)

The only answer I’ve been able to come up with is that Flowey wasn’t lying when he said he’d changed his mind and decided it was all a bad idea.  Just like the other monsters- Papyrus, Undyne, Mettaton, and sans- he’d come to realize that Chara’s killing spree was never going to stop.  That Chara wasn’t interested in just getting out of the Underground, they wanted to keep going.  They wouldn’t stop until everyone was dead- and Flowey, of all people, knew that if they could reset outside the Underground (a possibility which can neither be proven nor disproven), they would have no reason to stop.  And with every life they took, their LV would grow higher and higher.  If resets are possible outside the Underground, Chara could literally destroy the entire human population.  Maybe even all life on Earth.

Flowey had realized this.  And even though his understanding was triggered by selfishness and survival- namely, that he realized Chara would kill him next- he knew he couldn’t let it continue.  Asgore would be Chara’s last chance to get a monster SOUL, and he had to take that chance away from them.

And truly, Flowey’s final act of defiant selflessness, while too little too late, is semi-successful.  If you never do a Soulless Pacifist run, then you can never breach the barrier and reach the surface.  In truth, Flowey probably thought he was successful, because who would expect that evil Chara would lie dormant inside Frisk’s mind for as long as necessary until reaching the surface?

Please note that I’m not saying Chara is responsible for the Genocide Run.  I keep saying “Chara” because that is who Flowey assumes is in control- and by the time we reach Asgore and Flowey, that seems to be case, as Chara has apparently wrested all control away from us.

#undertale #genocide route #flowey #asgore #my theory #soul

[mar64ds]

Flowey's trauma metaphor

(CONTENT WARNING: themes about trauma, unreality, emotional numbness and child death)

I said this would be an essay but it really isn't, it's just me rambling about Flowey. There is no structure here, it's a mess, but I hope I at least make my point clear

I think we should start by the beginning, specially with how Flowey was created in the first place. I'm assuming you have played the game already if you're reading this analysis on the character, so I don't think I need to explain the reason why Flowey exists. However we do have to point out something: Flowey was born out of a tragedy. That's obvious of course, Asriel died and his ashes fell into the golden flowers garden, but metaphorically speaking you could say that Flowey was quite literally borned out of a traumatic experience for Asriel: Chara's death and his own death, both of those experiences changed him forever.

It's not that Flowey is pure evil, it's not the fact that he doesn't have a soul, if Asriel hadn't lived through these two experiences first he would have definitely been a little bit different Flowey started off well, he acted a lot like Asriel and was friends with everyone, it was only when he got bored that he started doing horrible things. This is unrelated to the trauma metaphor, this is part of the Undertale theme of resetting and how it can corrupt a person, and in this case it was a misguided kid, I'm not saying that Flowey became a murderer simply because 'he had trauma'. However it's important to point this out because of something both Flowey and Asriel say to Frisk a bunch of times Apparently both Flowey and Asriel point out that Flowey can't 'feel', that he doesn't care about others and he's incapable of doing so. As other people have pointed out before, this is not even true at all, Flowey does absolutely care about others in his own way, and if anything he's a mess of emotions that he has bottled up. Flowey does however feel in a very different way that how Asriel used to feel: he feels empty quite a lot of times, it's really difficult for him to get attached to others and he thinks being nice only leads you to get killed

These three things are very obvious signs of trauma, not just a lack of soul. Flowey is basically a kid that was given way too much power when he had a lot of unresolved trauma. Since he was literally killed when he tried to be nice in the past now he thinks being nice would get him killed again. Getting attached to others is terrifying to him because after being killed, resurrected and given the power of resetting, reality seems meaningless to him, therefore relatioships don't even feel real anymore except for the person he is the most familiar with (Chara), and that's terrifying! But again kid, it's not the lack of soul, is poorly treated trauma. Not to mention the fact that he’s just afraid of getting attached to anyone because he thinks he’ll just get hurt in the end. And after going through a traumatic experience a lot of people feel empty inside, like they don't feel anything at all, and it can be terrifying as well (I've been there myself! It sucked)

So both Asriel and Flowey believe Flowey is simply horrible, he doesn't have a soul, so he's not good, he's not 100% Asriel anymore so he's not himself anymore. However not only was Flowey good at the beginning but he can perfectly be good once again, because the problem is not the lack of soul or the fact that he's a flower now, is that he has went through a lot and all of these experiences have changed him. His trauma wasn't treated therefore he was very mislead, he was given too much powers and that made things worse.

I think Flowey is incredibly misinterpreted by the fans sometimes. Don't get me wrong, everyone knows Flowey is a deep character and not just a one dimensional evil villain, but I feel like a lot of people think that Asriel is trapped in Flowey, and not that Flowey is still Asriel. Many people might believe that Flowey is some evil version of Asriel, that Flowey only becomes better after Asriel turns back to Asriel in the final battle, etc. Of course Asriel isn't truly like how he used to be when he's Flowey, but if anything that adds more to the metaphor Flowey is quite literally the personification of Asriel's untreated trauma. Flowey isn't a sweet little kid anymore, he's not nice all the time, he's not hopeful,... Now he's a bit more cynical, more distant, etc all because he was hurt and he hasn't healed. But it doesn't mean he's not Asriel, he is, he has just changed. A lot of people that go through bad experiences miss some of the traits they used to have when they were younger, but it also hurts not being accepted by the person they are now. Being constantly reminded of how you used to be and how you should be like that again and get over everything that made you thet person you are right now hurts so much. It's important to help others with their struggles, but asking them to be who they were in the past is not the right answer. It's okay to embrace the person you are now.

So imagine being Flowey, whose whole existence is being constantly reminded that he is not Asriel anymore, I'm sure that doesn't help at all and only causes him to either want to separate himself from Asriel more or hate himself even more for not being who he used to be Flowey could change for the better at any moment, it's not just when he stops being Flowey that he can realize his mistakes, it's not like he suddenly forgets everything when he stops being Asriel and becomes Flowey again. One of my favorite scenes of the whole game is the neutral ending, because it's the most character depth we see in Flowey himself, not just in Flowey being Asriel, but just Flowey being Flowey. Flowey can learn, Flowey can feel ashamed of his actions, Flowey can feel so overwhelmed that he cries and runs away. That doesn't seem very 100% evil to me

When Flowey turns into God of Hyperdeath Asriel, he doesn't stop hurting others only because he's Asriel now, if anything it's made pretty clear that even when he's transformed back into Asriel he's the same person Flowey was. The reason why Asriel stops hurting others is because Frisk reminded them of Chara (like I said before, the most familiar person to him, familiarity can keep a person grounded to reality when they feel very attached to it at the moment) and because he could feel how much all the monsters loved Frisk. And another important fact about Flowey is how alone he is, how much he isolates himself from everyone, which is the biggest reason why he ends up the way he did, he didn't had the help he needed. So when he remembers what truly caring about someone is like, he can't keep being a horrible person anymore, he needs to stop, he needs to try to be better again.

Overall of course I wish Asriel was Asriel, the kid deserves to be happy and being a flower must not be fun, I'm really glad he has a happier life in Deltarune. But to see Flowey as an unhappy ending to Asriel is a bit unfair, that's still Asriel, he's just a bit different, and that's okay Flowey is pretty much Asriel after going through a traumatic experience. Flowey is just a part of how Asriel is now and that's okay, even if he was a goat again Flowey, in other words: his trauma, would still be a part of him, and that's okay. As long as he finally has the support he always needed, he is able to heal, and go back to how he usually is, just a bit more different this time, then he's going to be okay. ...But yeah in a perfect world both Asriel and Flowey would exist at the same time

#my analyses

[nitw]

Can you explain what you mean with misinterpreting Chara? I've always been confused about that character and you seem to have a pretty solid read you alluded to in that post about Snowgrave.

of course!!! as your local chara defender since the ripe age of 13 i hope you don't mind me doing a small essay on this. please bear with me tho because i sometimes can't articulate my thoughts well on stories that deal with philosophical themes ;;

UHHH SPOILERS FOR UNDERTALE AND DELTARUNE CHAPTER 2 BELOW

first let me make a few things clear so i don't have to repeat myself a bunch:

only tobias radiation fox himself has The Word of God privilege when it comes to things that haven't been explicitly confirmed in the games yet, EVEN if they're strongly hinted at. don't take anything i say about the plot as more than firm personal interpretation based on the info we have right now!

i cannot stress this one enough: undertale is a game that was never meant to be experienced from a singular perspective/mindset. the genocide route doesn't JUST exist for the sake of "enjoy your personalized edgy fuck-you run for being a serial killer in a video game", every one of the total 93 endings (look it up) in this game exists to reflect the player who achieved it in one way or another. the genocide route is really no different from any of the others, because in the end, no matter what, the player who decided to go through with the things they did will ALWAYS be rewarded for it. the question the player will have to ask THEMSELF afterwards is "is this what i wanted?"

OK MOVING ON-

let's think back to the little but vital amount of info we have on who chara actually was, like, as a person. we know pretty much all of this due to 1) the tapes in the royal lab 2) asriel's additional dialogue at the end of true pacifist.

while we'll never really know why frisk fell into the underground, asriel tells us explicitly about chara's hatred for humanity, and how they jumped from mt. ebott for "not a very happy reason"; supposedly a suicide attempt. chara "never talked about why", it's left intentionally vague because their reasoning isn't really what matters. what DOES matter is how this is relevant to the genocide run, ESPECIALLY with the new obvious parallels in deltarune's snowgrave route. i'll get to that.

when you finish the genocide route, chara will talk directly to the player in person. they talk about your (you AND chara's) success, despite "their plan (having) failed". this "plan" is one they secretly made with asriel when they were both still alive, as revealed from the tapes. chara got terminally poisoned from eating buttercups (whether this was fully intentional or not is still kiiinda up for debate), and while on their deathbed, asriel says that he doesn't like the plan anymore. yet despite his fear, he still fused his soul to chara's when they died.

the actual plan here was to become a monster powerful enough to slaughter humanity, specifically chara's home village by their own dying request - this all ties into their mysterious spite and hatred mentioned before. but due to asriel's resistance against chara, their fused body was killed by the humans - which eventually led to the creation of flowey, and asriel's inner demons after death.

but back to the genocide route. during chara's monologue to the player, they give us a LOT of important exposition. basically:

at the very start of the game, frisk's own determination is literally what brought chara's soul 'back to life'. we know how human and monster souls are different and how "determination" in this universe is something only humans possess, so it makes sense why it awakened them. i won't get into the whole narrator theory because i feel like it's not that relevant to my point (it's fun tho), but chara is always present from the moment frisk falls down, and stays regardless of the player's actions.

if you managed to finish undertale at all you'll already kinda know this (thanks sans), but the EXP and LV you (can) gain throughout your journey aren't just numbers on your screen - they're genuine in-universe manifestations of power that increase when you kill someone. and in genocide, chara explains how they were directly affected every time your stats rose. they could FEEL their spirit growing stronger for every life you decided to take (REMINDER THAT THE GENOCIDE ROUTE CAN BE PERMANENTLY STOPPED AT ANY POINT BEFORE SANS. YOU DID THIS.), so is it really that strange that they felt the desire to grow even stronger?

and once you do reach this point, there's no return. all that excessive time and effort you put into killing off a civilization OBVIOUSLY has some consequences. the consequences HERE being - if you paid attention to chara's life story - you took advantage of a traumatized child who was already at the breaking point and making irrational choices on their own, and you led them to believe that this was what they needed!

this is VERY MUCH SUPPORTED by the snowgrave/weird/pipis/whatever route of deltarune chapter 2 that was discovered about 2 days ago as i'm writing this. i'm gonna go ahead and assume you know what happens in it and i don't care to go into details if you don't, since this post is about chara, but surprise: THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT HAPPENED TO NOELLE, TOO! even in a completely normal run, noelle makes it clear multiple times that she wouldn't mind staying in the dark world; that in spite of how scary and dangerous it seems at times (something something horror movies), she started to feel at home. POSSIBLY even more so than her ACTUAL HOME, with her dying dad and negligent mom. like chara, noelle is a young person with low self esteem and her fair share of trauma, even if it's not as apparent. and like in the genocide run, the player's desire to ruthlessly kill in order to grow stronger affected her already-poor mental state.

someone else already pointed this out specifically, so don't credit me for it, but the main difference between chara and noelle is that noelle managed to break free in the end.

if you're like Most People Who Played The Genocide Route Back In Like 2016 and you played the genocide route with no further knowledge about it than "i have to follow these specific steps to get a harder fucked up version of the game", i don't blame you. you didn't actually know what you were doing in the end, did you? but did the outcome disappoint you, make sense to you, or did it just leave you with an empty/confused feeling? i love undertale because it WILL force you to think about things like that. i mean, if the result wasn't gonna affect you in SOME way, why would you go through all of that trouble in the first place? you had your reasons, as the player of any video game where you know your choices matter. would you have carried out the entire thing if you knew what was coming? the answer to that is only relevant to yourself.

#i'm EXHAUSTED girl. #asks #chara #ut #undertale #dr #deltarune #noelle holiday #dr spoilers #deltarune spoilers

[pyreo]

deltarune megapost

I wanted to make a Deltarune post about the lore and the things that aren’t  obvious. And once I do that I wanna focus on why Mettaton is incredibly important to this setting

And also why he poses a problem

Why did Toriel and Asgore get divorced?

Without the setting of Undertale, Asgore and Toriel’s marriage still broke up after they had Asriel. There needs to be a reason though. In UT it was Asgore’s ‘worst of both worlds’ decision regarding killing anybody that fell from the human world, including children. We saw how close they were before this happened. Only something deep and serious caused that rift. In Deltarune, what on earth did Asgore do?

What happened to Dess?

Mentioned a handful of times by Noelle, Dess was her older sister and is mentioned In Undertale.... in that Xbox exclusing casino thing. The way Noelle talks about her, the conspicuous way Noelle gets locked out of her big house - it implies Dess is gone or deceased. Berdly recalls a spelling bee when he and Noelle were younger where she, despite being smarter than him, misspelled ‘December’, allowing him to win.

In the two-player spelling puzzle, it also spells out ‘December’ as Noelle recalls the past and her silhouette regresses to a child while she does so. Being distracted by her sister’s disappearance, rather than pure shyness, could account for her misspelling her name on stage, and it clearly left a big psychological mark for her to have this visual regression in the Dark World.

However, there’s a graveyard in Hometown with no Dess. I heard another theory that she has been missing for years, because where each character’s personal room is made by Queen to reflect their tastes via their search results, Noelle has a calendar where every day is December 25th. This could imply that Noelle continually searches the internet for ‘December Holiday’, her sister’s name, to see if there are clues to her disappearance, but of course the only result you would get is the date of Christmas.

Who is the Knight?

It’s now implied to be Kris, who has been forcibly removing the player’s influence to act on their own. By all accounts the Knight is the game’s main antagonist. Spade King and Queen both mention the Knight as someone who influenced their position - they brought Spade King to absolute power, and showed Queen that creation of new worlds was possible.

We’re led to believe that Kris was doing this, because they’ve been acting outside of the player’s control. Eating the entire pie between chapter 1 and 2 might have been a red herring to cover that they also went to the library and used that knife to slash open a dark fountain there.

However. This has issues. How would they even manage to shuffle slowly all the way to the library and get in the computer lab? The Knight is also the one creating the hidden bosses. They talked to Jevil until he realised he was in a game and he lost his mind; they ruined Spamton’s life by elevating him to success and then crushing him. Whatever the Knight is doing seems to be deliberately planned with key players in mind.

Kris opening the fountain at home at the end of ch.2 can be explained in that you just figured out in Cyber World that anyone determined enough can do this, and so, Kris decided to. So a better question might even be...

What does Kris want?

We have no idea. They are capable of removing the SOUL, ‘us’, temporarily, and putting things in motion we cannot influence. But they also keep putting us back in control afterward. This is hinted at right when ch.2 starts, where if you inspect the cage in Kris’s bedroom they threw us into, the description says it’s inescapable. Meaning Kris came back and took us out, willingly.

They allow us to pilot them through the game. Why? Because they cannot live without the SOUL for long for some reason? Because they’re bad at bullet hell? Why did they slash Toriel’s tyres before opening the fountain, making sure nobody could drive away?? Why did they specifically open the door?

You can find out details about Kris through the creepy way you interact with the townsfolk, who think you are Kris. They play the piano at the hospital waiting room - better than you. They used to go to church just to get the special church juice. It’s all normal, relatable things, not like someone who’s trying to plunge the world into darkness. Judging by their search history portrayed in their Queen’s castle room, they really want to see their brother again. However the castle has a room based on Asriel’s search history too, and Kris (not you) closes their eyes and won’t look at it.

What is Ralsei?

His name is an anagram of Asriel. Is he an extension of Asriel? The slightly flirtier dialogue in ch.2 would point to no. Is he an extension of Kris themselves, given the link between Kris’s childhood habit of wearing a headband with red horns on it, to pretend to be a monster like their family?

Ralsei knows exactly where the Dark World in the school is located, and unlike regular Darkners, knows the world is folded up inside the ‘real world’. There’s a certain whiplash to Ralsei telling you to hop out of his reality into yours and go down the hallway to retrieve all the board game items.

How does he jump from one Dark World to another, without assistance? How does he not get petrified like Lancer and Rouxls? Is this a power level thing because he’s a prince or something else? We definitely do not know enough about Ralsei.

He also says this incredibly suspicious thing after you spare Spamton NEO. Susie was also curious but accepts that maybe it ‘didn’t mean anything’, which is a sure tell that these optional bosses do mean something.

Someone is orchestrating what’s happening, opening fountains, manipulating the rulers, and influencing NPCs to become the optional bosses. Why? I suspect Ralsei for both knowing too much, and pretending something doesn’t matter when it clearly does. Until Asriel actually comes home from college I’m going to suspect he’s involved in this too.

How much does Seam know?

Seam on the other hand knows a lot about what’s going on but is openly withholding information while helping you. He’s nihilistic. He says things like:

One day soon... You too, will begin to realize the futility of your actions. Ha ha ha... At that time, feel free to come back here. I'll make you tea... And we can toast... to the end of the world!

Either this ‘end of the world’ is a reference to The Roaring, where opening too many dark fountains dooms the Dark World and the real one... or, I can’t get out of my head the idea that Deltarune takes place in a fake, or weird reconstruction of Undertale where things don’t match up, and eventually it will have to disappear. After all, powers of determination and creating and manipulating universes are Undertale’s basic bread and butter. How can we look at an Alternate Universe containing the characters we already know and not suspect that? Seam also uses Gaster’s key words, ‘darker, yet darker’, seemingly to clue us in that he’s not off track here.

Why haven’t we seen Papyrus?

This is a bright neon flashing ‘something’s not right’ sign. It’s not like Papyrus’s voice actor was too busy or anything. His absence is noticable and for a reason. Nice of Sans to promise we could meet him despite being aware we’re piloting a child’s body around, though, even if he didn’t follow through.

What locations in town could be used for dark fountains in the next 4 chapters?

If the sequence continues, we have chapter 1 in the school games room, chapter 2 in a computer lab, and chapter 3 in front of Kris’s television, where the aesthetic of each setting influences the world, characters, and enemies in the Dark World created there. Future possibilities include the church, the hospital, sans’s grocery store, Noelle’s house, and the closed bunker.

What the hell’s in the closed bunker

This one’s too obvious, honestly. I think it’ll open for no reason in chapter 7 and a little white dog will bounce out and steal one of your key items and nothing else happens.

Why does Asgore have these

Unlike the bunker feeling like a joke teaser, I gotta believe this is foreshadowing something weird. For example, what does opening a dark fountain in here with the seven flowers do? Does it just take you into Undertale?

Each chapter will have a hidden boss with a ‘soul mode’ from Undertale

Chapter 1 let you stay red, but I think each subsequent chapter is going to change your soul mode to one of the seven colours and design the encounter around that. Purple, yellow, green and blue were used in Undertale, leaving the light blue and orange modes yet to be revealed.

How does Spamton emulate Mettaton Neo’s name, body, and incorporate his battle theme, and the ‘Dummy!’ theme, with no actual connection between them ingame?

This is a really fun one that’s explained over in this post here. Swatch is the Dark World creation from the paint program on the library computers, so he’s able to explain that a Lightner made the robot body decaying in the castle basement that way.

Mettaton went to the library and drew his ideal form, Mettaton NEO, in MS Paint, and the Dark World formed that into a puppet body which Spamton was able to hijack temporarily. So by doing that Spamton was able to channel Mettaton’s appearance, attacks, music, and SOUL mode for the fight.

This might mean that the future hidden bosses, each with their own SOUL mode, might be based on the associated character for that mode (Muffet, Undyne, and Sans or Papyrus), and the boss will take on some aspect of them from their world to leech their fight mechanics.

The Problem With Mettaton

We don’t exactly know what Deltarune is about. It’s an alternate universe where the characters from Undertale already live on the surface, have completely normal lives, but diverge from the storyline of Undertale and, crucially, have not lived through the changes Frisk brought to their lives.

Remember how Undertale had a dozen different ending routes depending on who you befriended? The constant reinforcement in Undertale was that your choices mattered. Through Frisk, you chose to bring Alphys closure about her mistakes, you chose to befriend papyrus instead of attacking him, you chose to help Alphys and Undyne realise their feelings for each other and it’s only doing that that leads to the golden ending and escape to the surface.

Deltarune is the opposite, your choices do not matter. The only thing you can do to force the route of the game to change is to force Noelle into a No Mercy run, which is indirect, and also, a total desperation to mess with an otherwise set course. This version of the characters have not been helped by Frisk - Undyne and Alphys are not together, Papyrus has no friends, Asgore cannot get over himself, and they’re clearly the worse for it, but potentially, you COULD still do these things. In fact it’s hinted that you already are.

But there’s Mettaton.

He’s still a ghost and does not leave his house. In Frisk’s world, Gaster deleted himself, promoting Alphys to royal scientist by bluffing with Mettaton, and she then build him his ideal body. In Kris’s world... Alphys is a school teacher. There’s no barrier to break, no reason to experiment on souls, no Flowey mistake, and no body for Mettaton.

It was sad in Ch.1, but now with the Spamton NEO fight in ch.2, it’s unmissable. Mettaton wants that body and he cannot get it. Alphys in this universe is not going to leave her teaching job and suddenly be able to build a robot. Mettaton is just... screwed out of his happy ending and cannot get it.

So what resolution could this have? If it wasn’t for Mettaton I might believe in the vaildity of Deltarune and Hometown. But. How can you doom this character? If Undertale was the only way Mettaton could be befriended, then Undertale is Primary Universe A and Seam is right - the world of Deltarune is doomed as some kind of aberration. It all relies on how this gets explained in the future, but the core mystery of Deltarune is how exactly this universe intersects with Undertale and whether one is an offshoot of the other. How the Dark World links into that is another complication. But even as we get more fun characters and neat stuff in the Dark Worlds, let’s not forget we have absolutely no idea why Undertale’s characters are living here with no mention of underground or why there are no other humans beside Kris.

#undertale #deltarune #welcome to my giant essay post

[aflippedflop]

EN GARDE FOR A TROUSLE WITH THE GREAT PAPYRUS!!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

That's right folks, the results are in and The Great and Grand Papyrus was chosen as the next design to be shown off for Flipflopped's Cast!!! Isn't he a dream boat???

Since Papyrus here swaps with Undyne (Incase that wasn't obvious before), Papyrus is now the majestic and handsome leader of the Royal Guard and is a symbol of hope for the monsters that one day the final seventh human will fall down to the underground and face and uncertain demise when trousling with someone as prestigious as the Great Papyrus, The Temmie Brigade, the Four Royal Guards, and the King's Mercenaries... and Undyne and Alphys too, I guess.

Papyrus is a kind and goofy skeleton with a heart of gold but unlike Classic Papyrus, Flipflopped Papyrus is far more agressive and tricky in combat. Focusing on sending out complex attacks that test your wits, your mind, your ability to hit the "up" key to jump which is not hard at all, and your memorizing skills. Papyrus here likes to switch between the Red and Blue Soul modes making the Human have to pay attention to what kind of Bone attacks do what in whatever soul mode you're in, he also likes to send out multiple type of attacks at once (Of course Papyrus made sure that it is 100% Humanly dodgeable so it's a fair fight.) But Papyrus does want you to stay on your toes and expect the unexpected.

For this very occasion, Papyrus wields a giant bone mallet that he can use to slam it into the battle box and cause your soul to instantly fall to the bottom of the box or Papyrus can swing the hammer to the sides causing it to rocket to the left or right side of the screen or even have the box bounce off the walls like one of the DVD Player Logo bouncing screens. Not to mention the fact he sends out both normal white attacks, as well as Blue attacks. Of course, Papyrus makes sure to slowly ease the human into knowing these different things. There is no class at all in sending all these things at the opponent without giving them a proper tutorial. His fighting style can basically be described as "Classic Papyrus, but it's on Hard mode now. Like the whole time. (TM)"

Papyrus does have Undyne's very... violent and "over the top" personality traits, but Papyrus is still a very kind goober who doesn't actually wish to kill a human and deliver them to King Napstablook. Papyrus feels like that isn't fair to the human (Frisk) to just fall in and get beaten up for when they never did anything wrong, atleast in more passive routes. Papyrus would much rather be friends with a human but is forced to fight due to his status of Captain of the Royal guard. He's too much of a nice guy to be in such a rough and tumble job. But it was always Papyrus's dream to be very popular amongst the other monsters with his captain status, but he also respects the drive the king had about freeing monsters from their prison, of course Papyrus has Undyne's violent tendencies like instead of using the door to enter his house, he jumps through the window instead and asks his brothers or Undyne to rate the landing.

Papyrus lives in Waterfall with his older brother, Sans, and his babybones brother, Gaster. The three, like actual siblings, often get themselves into all sorts of shenanigans and can annoy eachother sometimes, like Sans, who refuses to pick up all the socks laying all over the place in his house (Which is where Undyne's house is located by the way). But regardless of the sock related squabbles, they all love eachother and stick by each other, no matter what. Lately that can't be said with Sans, who has concerned Papyrus immensely with him suddenly staying at his lab in Hotland for days on end without ever leaving. Papyrus wishes Sans could tell him what's eating at him, but like several other things, Sans won't tell Papyrus his little secret.

But regardless, Papyrus is a total goober with a heart of gold. Such a cool dude, right?

Anyway I hope you guys like these designs for Papyrus and I'm down for if anyone has some Papyrus related asks. Thank you and I hope you all have a nice rest of your day/night.

-ProctorDorkchop

#flipflopped #aflippedflop #Official Character Art #character art #Papyrus #The Great Papyrus #Sans #Gaster #Undertale AU #Waterfall #The Royal Guard #Cool Dude #so cool. #SHUT UP SANS!!!

[freshouttaparsnips]

But, despite his best efforts, Edge was awake before him that morning, noticing that Papyrus was nowhere to be found, waking Sans on the couch with a near violent shake. Sans glared up at him, Edge glaring back before whispering a harsh “Sorry. Where’s your brother.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

woooo, this fic won the poll from the Helping-A-Friend Drive (sorta, it was a two way tie and I chose this), so it’s getting updated until its done!!

ya’ll might read back a bit, this is chapter 9 lol

reader it on Ao3

or read it below!!

(and check out the post explaining my drive and how to help!)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It wasn’t very long after the Fell brothers showed up, perhaps a week at most that Sans felt a change in the air. It was familiar, unfortunately, and it… was coming at a really bad time, actually. Neither of the dust bros would have any idea of what to do about any of it, which was a problem all on its own.

The actual issue was something else entirely, but he couldn’t really be honest about it. Grillby was the only one of anyone that knew anything about it, and Sans would really have rather kept it that way.

But, despite his best efforts, Edge was awake before him that morning, noticing that Papyrus was nowhere to be found, waking Sans on the couch with a near violent shake. Sans glared up at him, Edge glaring back before whispering a harsh “Sorry. Where’s your brother.”

Sans blinked. “What’dya mean? Isn’t he usually out runnin’ with you around now?”

Edge was quiet for a disconcertingly long time, before finally answering. “Normally, yes, we would be halfway done with our run.” He glanced up the stairs at Papyrus’ room, the door firmly shut, the “No One Allowed!” sign hung.

Well. At least Paps had done Sans the decency of putting the sign up. That was always nice.

“It’s alright buddy.” Sans finally drawled, scratching at his back as he sat up. “But we should head out for a while. Grab your bro and lets skedaddle.”

Edge looked about two seconds from arguing, but Sans deadeyed him long enough that he scowled, turning on heel and stomping up the steps.

It was a good thing Paps had his room soundproofed when they came up here. That was for damn sure.

Red finally tromped down the steps after a very grumpy Edge, the two of them looking like they were about to start a fire for fun or something if Sans didn’t start explaining himself pretty quick. Good thing he had about zero plans to.

“Alright, grab your coats, kiddos, we’re goin’ on a field trip.”

He didn’t give them much actual time to argue, grabbing them both by the arm and taking a short cut the straight hell outta there. Papyrus didn’t need the two of them breathing down his neck while he was dealing with shit… and none of the running had to do with Sans not wanting to be anywhere near the house for a while, nope.

No, this was entirely pragmatic, beneficial for all of them, and they could pick up a few of the essentials on the way there.

~.~

It took a couple pit stops, and a bit of dodging whenever they actually got to their destination, but when Sans finally let them get a good look at their surroundings, the bones stopped flying (he was pretty sure they weren’t actually aiming for him), and their sockets got wide.

Living on the west coast had its benefits, mostly the ocean. Sans took the kid out here at least once a month, Toriel usually accompanying them for the sole reason that she actually really enjoyed sunbathing. Wasn’t cause she and Sans had been best friends for a long ass time, ‘course not.

“Is that…” Edge started, before stopping as Sans stuff a plastic bag first in his, then Red’s hands.

“The ocean? Yeah, don’t go too far out or we’ll see if skeletons can actually drown.” Turning to Red, he gave a wink. “There changing rooms over yonder, I got you both a t-shirt and trunks. I hope they fit.”

And with that he turned on foot, heading straight down towards the beach, the water looking as chilly and inviting as possible on such a warm day. It was a shame… Papyrus would have loved to see the utter hidden joy in Edge’s eyes as he grabbed Red and pulled him towards the changing rooms.

Sans let them at it, it wasn’t like they were going anywhere else with this opportunity right in front of them, and besides, Sans had someone he’d been waiting to see for a while.

“Sans!! Sans you little goofbone, we are over here!” Toriel’s voice carried over the crowd, but Sans didn’t give a shit who looked to see who was shouting. He only had eyes for the Queen of all Monsters, and the child that sat on a beach blanket next to her.

“Heya Tori. Long time no see.” He answered, padding through the sand to stand next to their little picnic spot. The kid was chomping down on a sandwich, a little juice box next to them on the blanket. Toriel was laid out, like usual, but was sitting up a little to greet little old him. “Nice to sea you.”

Toriel laughed, the sound loud and abrasive in the best of ways. Taking a breath, she grinned sharp. “Shell we settle down and talk a little? Perhaps ketchup on current events?” She held up a ketchup packet, Sans snorting at the obvious pun before he waddled close enough to plop next to her on the blanket.

“Yeah, that sounds great actually.” Settling in, he wiggled into her ample back, ignoring her laughter as she swatted at him, though still letting him lay where he wanted.

“So who are your guests?” Toriel finally asked, watching Frisk, who’d given Sans a look before taking off towards the water.

Sans sighed, really not wanting to spill the beans so early, but Toriel had actually figured it out on her own pretty quick. When he’d gotten a call, the texting not working on her phone again for whatever stars forsaken reason, she’d mentioned going to the beach, and he’d agreed to come. Then Papyrus coming had been brought up, and Sans was really bad at lying actually, when he thought about it.

“They’re cousins. I think. I dunno skeleton family lines, we probably aren’t even related.”

Toriel hummed to herself. “How fortunate. The tall one is very fine.”

Sans choked on air, tears breaking over his sockets as he laughed. “What the hell!” he garbled out, though he watched as Edge and Red slowly made their way over, clearly unnerved by the amount of humans.

“I only speak the truth.” Toriel whispered, sure of herself as she smirked, standing to her full height to greet the murder bros.

“Hello! I’m told you are not related to Sans, but that you know him. You are very welcome to share in our picnic, I brought plenty of food.”

Red was staring gobsmacked, clearly looking for similarities in the Toriel he’d once known, while Edge was looking purely intimidated.

“I… Thank you, your majesty, but we couldn’t possibly-” Edge tried, but Toriel only gave him a look.

She gently took his hand from his chest, patting it once before leading him over to the blanket. “When I say there’s enough, there’s enough. Take a break, guardsman, you’re no longer in the presence of royalty.”

Sans was pretty well gobsmacked himself, if he was honest, but sitting there on the blanket, watching Toriel work the brothers in the sly, kind way she did everyone that started out difficult… it was awe inspiring.

He only hoped Paps was okay, this time.

#fresh writes #undertale #fontcest #papcest #sanscest #spicykustardpuff #weird shenanigans #hurt/comfort #wine aunt toriel

[pyrefell]

Helllo!!! I’m loving your headcanons so far!!!

Do you have any general personalities descriptions for your boys yet?

a of all, bsdaifjkbfjkowp thank you!!! b of all, im sorry this took so long?? i rewrote it like 3 times & it still might change bc im indecisive. also it turned into a lil bit of a headcanon post. i hope its understandable?

once again i am struck with the fact that the boys need nicknames. hmm.

UNDERTALE:

Sans: Guy who is deliberately and unabashedly Cringe. Overall, fairly laid back. However, he still prefers to maintain distance between himself and most people. It was already a natural facet of his personality but it was exacerbated by the Timeline Jank. People tend to forget he’s as smart as he is, they don’t think he’s stupid, they just mostly know that funnyman side of him. If you're a dick to Papyrus, he's gonna be a dick to you.  

Papyrus: Things are so exciting and fascinating to him, even the most mundane things. Despite seeming completely oblivious to things that seem completely obvious, he's very smart and deceptively cunning. Even though he knows how people see him (a big loud child) and he doesn't get quite the reception his brother does, he knows he'll win them over one day! He tries to avoid thinking about how lonely he actually is. It’s fine. He knows Sans is dealing with something (he won’t tell him what) but he figures he doesn’t need much else on his plate.

UNDERSWAP:

Sans: In this post, I mentioned that he's kind of always naturally been the more outgoing brother and that he's taken on this much more outgoing and bubbly persona as a result of the impact the timelines have had on him. He's competitive in a more aggressive way (maybe not quite the right word to use but), by which I mean he's kind of a sore loser sometimes. Also? He's a huge flirt, he's pretty skilled in the art of flustering.

Papyrus: Also in this post, I said that he's pretty chill until the conversation turns to something he's passionate about, then he reaches True Papyrus Volume Levels (and Chaos Levels). He is fairly relaxed, yes, but part of it is compensating for how awkward he can be. He gets embarrassed really easy, even something as small as misunderstanding something that was said. However! He’s a pretty popular artist online! Though he uses a pseudonym, being recognized and talked to by a stranger in public is not something he would look forward to.

UNDERFELL:

Sans: He’s cruel and crude, that’s kind of his whole thing. He’s not really the best at keeping a hold on his temper (though there’s a few other factors at play there). Keeping up the whole tough guy persona is the number one priority thus he doesn’t deal much with his emotions or inner turmoil or any of that other crap. Like US!Sans, he’s a flirt, except his flirting is mostly crude comments and jokes. And yet, somehow it works? Guy who is a disaster. He’s oddly nostalgic, mostly about his relationship with Papyrus. He wishes he could have been a better brother, but it seems like their relationship is too far gone.

Papyrus: He also doesn’t have the best control of his temper but he has an image to keep, one of a cruel and cold Royal Guard Captain. He didn’t used to be like this, but it’s necessary for his survival. He’s still surprisingly empathetic, something that could never really be beat out of him. HUGE perfectionist nearly to the point of it being debilitating. He oscillates between hating how weak he is and desperately wanting to be able to be weak. While he acts prideful about his ‘work’ int the Royal Guard, he is genuinely prideful about things like his cooking. Often to the point of arrogance.

SWAPFELL:

Sans: He’s seen as very cold and calculating, well-spoken. But he also knows when and how to turn on the charm. That’s how he’s even made it this far in life, it’s vital to his survival. He can also be very prideful, particularly in his position as Queen Toriel’s right hand and in his ability to remain cool in high stress situations. He’s well aware of how overprotective he is with Papyrus, he’s terrified of how cruel the world is and terrified that he’s stunted him to the point of not being able to cope with it.

Papyrus: He’s deathly shy. If it were safe/a good idea to use his own brand of shortcuts to get out of situations, by god would he. He, like his non-Fell counterpart, thrives in the relative anonymity of being online. Past that barrier of shyness, he’s excitable and surprisingly jovial. He tries to find some reason to be at least content, he thinks it helps Sans worry less (even if it doesn’t really). He’s actually pretty mischievous, though only dares to pull pranks on his brother.

HORRORTALE:

Sans: Horribly cynical and jaded. He’s working on it, even if he doesn’t particularly want to sometimes. He’s not home, so to speak, most of the time. He’s easily frustrated by the gaps in his memory, then he forgets why he’s frustrated and gets even more upset. He’s naturally very wary of everyone else and again, very much prefers to keep distance between himself and most everyone he comes into contact with.

Papyrus: He definitely tries to hide everything behind a happy demeanor, he tries to fix everything for just about anyone (especially his brother) without any fuss and tries to make it seem like he’s totally fine. There’s also this sense of jadedness, he tries to curb it but sometimes it still slips out. He still tries to act like himself, like he’d been before the Famine, but it’s exhausting and he’ll eventually come to terms with the fact that he’s no longer the same.

HORRORSWAP:

Sans: His competitive nature has morphed more into him being more of an aggressive hothead (though not quite to the level of UF!Sans). He’s really self-conscious about his new stutter and bringing it up frustrates him the same way treating him like a child had before. He has terrible mood swings, he can ruin his own day over nothing and it kills him. He’s really trying to get better, but he still has a hard time being honest with people.

Papyrus: He’s gotten pretty cynical since the Famine, he puts part of the blame on himself (if only he'd just been brave for once), even though he knows there's not really a whole lot he could have done. He’s even quieter than he used to be, he’d prefer if he could just fade into the background. He hates how much he stands out in any crowd and tries to avoid going out at all costs. The only one who can get him out is Sans because at least they can ignore everyone else and concern themselves with each other.

HORRORFELL:

Sans: He’s...mean. Like. He tends to be a major jackass. He can’t help but think well, humans aren’t exactly gonna wanna know a monster, much less him. And hey! Might just help keep his newly expanded family safe! He ain’t complainin’! He’s really just bitter about how things have gone for him and his brother (and about how things will likely go in the future). For as many dark jokes he makes to Frisk and Aliza, he’d be the first one to come to their rescue, he’s just that kind of friend.

Papyrus: He’s fairly quiet these days, but don’t think he’s not going to find some way to give you some kind of attitude. He’s been putting a lot of work into taming his anger, which is no small task considering everything. He still has his moments, but he prides himself in being able to cool off and keep himself somewhat calm. He still hasn’t been able to do much about his perfectionism, in fact it’s gotten worse, but he’s trying. And he, like his brother, is extremely protective of his little family, and god help anyone who dares try anything.

A B-Bonus????

UF!Comic Papyrus: (he’s the only one with a nickname...lol) Reggie here struggles a lot with who he is as a person, is he more Sans? More Papyrus? An even 50/50? Or is he someone else entirely? He’s introspective and hyper aware of his mannerisms, particularity in the ones he deems too Sans-like or too Papyrus-like. He’s not exactly the nicest, partially as a mechanism to keep people away (it’s just...easier that way). Reggie keeps to himself most of the time. He’s not shy though, he’s more than willing to speak his mind, even if it comes out more crass than it was intended.

#undertale headcanons #undertale #underswap #underfell #swapfell #horrortale #horrorswap #horrorfell #sans #papyrus #comic papyrus #ratsoh-writes #as always im not sure im happy w this but im not letting myself fuck w it any longer lol. #i was gonna add the bros from my own au but. ive never talked about them #maybe youll see them some other time

[jamestrmtx]

Fairytale Complex - [Undertale | Sans x Reader]

[Gender Neutral, Frisk's Parent Reader | Slow Burn]

Chapter Five | Snowy

[First] | [Previous] | [Next]

Here's an early update this week to make up for last week's missed update (due to finals). 

As a result, expect the usual update on Saturday, as well!

Also, there’s now a Tag List at the bottom of this chapter -- Feel free to message me or comment if you'd like to be included on the list!

• • •

"...So, did you go to the doctor?"

"Yes, dear."

"And what did she say?"

"It's possible I have anemia or something because of malnutrition."

"What's anemia?"

"That just means I don't have enough blood to stay active and do things as I usually do."

"And why did that happen? You've always made us eat healthy!"

"Frisk, honey…" You sigh and place a hand over your forehead, massaging the ache away. "I get that you're worried, but I need a moment to concentrate. The food'll burn if I keep getting distracted."

"Let me help you, then!"

"Not today. You should do your homework now so I can check it later."

"Why? I can help you if you're busy. And Toriel can help me with that later anyway!"

Needing patience, you stop your work on the stew and let out another breath, longer yet quieter this time. Then, you take a sip of water and set the cup aside to wash for later. "You're not going to see any more of your monster friends until I can at least get to know some of them better." You turn off the stove and let the stew rest while you do the same. "Toriel's an exception, yes. But that doesn't mean I'll allow you to visit her place if people like Sans are going to be there, too."

"But he helps me with science!"

"I'll take care of that, then."

"But you're busy!"

"I can make time."

"But isn't it okay if Toriel's gonna be there with him?"

"If it was, I wouldn't be telling you about this in the first place."

Frisk huffs and pouts, arms crossing as they look away from you. "It's not like he's a ticking time bomb anyway. He… He's not gonna hurt me!"

"How can you be so sure? Your (dad/other dad) left us out of the blue."

"I don't care about him, and he's not my dad anymore! Y- You shouldn't call him that, and you should stop comparing other people with him!"

"Don't talk like that. You know that's not-"

"It's true!" Their words almost come off in a shriek and tears stain their face. "He- He doesn't care about me anymore, so I won't care about him, either. It's his fault why you had to go to the doctor in the first place!" 

You stay quiet and watch as they blink through the tears, sniffling some of them back. Sensing they need a break from your gaze, you turn back to the stove and focus on continuing with the meal.

"I… I was okay with it the first week, but when I noticed how much better we've been doing just with Toriel alone, I- I got really, really mad at him! He doesn't care about us anymore, and he left us even before I ran away. If he wants to show he cares, then… Then he has to do something else besides sending you dumb What'sUp messages all the time."

You stop what you're doing again and catch the salt shaker just as it's about to fall into the pot, stew still resting and waiting for you to finish with flavouring it. Thankfully, the safety lock keeps it from making a mess, so you place it back where it was and thank the Heavens you don't have to salvage the food from being oversalted. When you recover, you stop looking at the pot to meet with Frisk's eyes, directing your widened ones at them.

"How do you know that?"

"It's obvious! Your face always gets all scrunched up and grumpy, and the ringtone's different to all the others."

"And what if it's someone else?'

"You don't text anyone else besides auntie and Sans sometimes!"

Their words hit you like a punch to the gut. 

Having your social life summarized so quickly almost makes you wince, and you feel the urge to ground them simply for those words alone, rather than for their earlier conduct regarding how they talked about Jerry. "I'm afraid I'll have to take your own phone away if you keep doing this. I don't know how you even figured all that stuff out, but you know it's not good to sneak up on things like this. You should ask me if you're curious, dear. And... And not just take a look at those messages whenever I'm not around."

"I haven't snooped around! The messages would show they're read, but all the stuff Jerry's sent you's still unread."

You smile and choose not to mention on how they continue to corner themselves the longer they speak, though you do acknowledge their awareness over small details, taking advantage of that by asking, "So that means you've read auntie and Sans's texts?"

They nod, unhesitating. "I know auntie's been telling you to get in touch with friends again. And you have a tour date with Sans this weekend!"

"Tour date where?"

"The Underground!" 

"And besides those two people, who's the last person I texted, and how long ago was it?"

Frisk stays quiet for a while this time, but it's made clear they're only seeking that information from their memory rather than realizing how far they've dug themselves into a hole. "Your coworker was last month, and one of your friends was two months ago." Their response is confident, although it doesn't take longer than a few seconds of silence between you for them to notice their mistakes. You don't say anything and stare at them with squinted eyes and an equally humoured grin, waiting.  "Um…" They can only stare with wide eyes; their body stays still while their mind processes just what exact mistakes were made. "I…"

"Go shower and dress up, dear," you say, biting back your smile. "We'll eat first before we go, and we can talk on the way there."

"To Toriel's place?"

You nod. "It's about time I met her in person rather than calls. And frankly, it's been… really irresponsible of me to let you continue visiting her despite me not being aware of who she is in person. I only allowed it because Serif was there, but after learning about what he did, I really don't want you near him."

"But you guys are going on a date this weekend!"

"If you're smart enough to know opening a message shows you've read it, then I'm sure you know that's not what that word means in that context."

"...What's context?"

"I won't keep playing your game, dear."

"But what if I really don't know what it means?"

"Then you can find it in a dictionary, or you can ask your tutors about it."

"You're being mean!"

"And you're being nosy."

Frisk frowns and crosses their arms. They attempt an angered expression, though it results in a faltering grimace as they try not to let their sadness known. Their lips stay pressed close together and their body shakes, all signs of them wanting to cry their feelings out. Still, they push through and regain some calm through a sigh. "I…" Their tone is just as reluctant as their posture, so you don't pressure and stay quiet. "I'm sorry, (mom/dad)." They let their arms loosen and stare up at you with stern eyes. "I was just worried about you. I… I didn't mean to look through your stuff. And I… I didn't mean to make you angry. I-"

"I'm not angry." You place a hand over their head and smile, tickling the back of their ear and gaining a smile back from them. "But what you did really wasn't right." You pause and take a breath, already weak and dizzied despite it still being one in the afternoon. "And even though there're times where you have to go against the rules, this isn't one of them. You could've gotten into trouble if it was a stranger or someone else, or you could've learned something the wrong way. If you need to know something, you should ask me directly, not just play spy about it. I won't know what's bothering you if you keep hiding it from me and getting your answers like this. Alright?"

Frisk responds with a hug rather than words. Their hold is tight, and they nearly cling onto you, face pressing against your torso as they cry against it. "I'm sorry," they whisper through their sniffles and hiccups, holding on tighter. "I- I… Could you tell me what's making you sad next time, then?"

"Of course, honey." You place a hand against the back of their head and brush your fingers through their hair. "...I should've done that sooner, too." You smile when they let go and meet with their eyes, these red and watery from the recent cry. "Your hair's getting longer," you add, ruffling it up. "Do you wanna cut it, or do you like it this way?"

"I like it this way!" Their words are as bright as their smile, and another look at them reveals a weight's been lifted off their shoulders. "Should I go do my homework now? I wanna stay with you today."

"Sure," you reply, letting your smile grow. "Do what you already know. I'll be there in a few to help you out."

"Thanks, (mom/dad)!"

With that, they stand on their tiptoes and kiss your cheek. Then, they run off to their room, leaving you to finish with the stew.

 • • •

Frisk's return equals to having a cramped calendar, where every single day's marked down with a sticker and a note to remind you over what you have to do.

Still, it doesn't erase the fact you need time for yourself, so you take up Frisk's concern over your health and happiness as advice for you to take better care of yourself. You start by stretching after an hour long nap, drinking some water, and opening up the envelope the two skeleton brothers had given you. Anticipation arrives with the reminder of what Papyrus hinted at about its contents. You tear it open, pull out the first thing you touch, and continue doing so until there's nothing left to take out and place on your nightstand. You then look at all the items laid out and notice that -- besides the business card Papyrus mentioned -- all other items are what he'd informed were from his brother.

Besides Alphys's contact information, there's...

What looks like a bunny-shaped notepad.

Two admission tickets.

A folded paper with some cards stuck to it.

And, as you feared, money.

If Papyrus mentioned only about Alphys's contact information being there, then it's a likelihood to assume the rest is from his older brother.

You take the notepad first and open it to see the first page has already been filled out, and it reads:

"so, uh… hey."

"i'm not too good at writin' letters, but i thought this notepad would be useful now that you're gonna keep a contact list of all the monsters frisk made friends with. i took the liberty of puttin' in the first ten i could think of. start with those first, and don't push yourself too hard."

The fourth and second to last item from the monster is what looks like an agreement letter and a pair of travel visas attached to it. You squint at the tiny lettering and adjust your glasses to begin with the reading.

"With the approval of former Royal Sentry and Judge, Comic Sans Serif, I hereby allow for (miss/mister) (Y/N) (L/N) to traverse the Underground with him by their side. It is important to note these tickets will expire in three days after their initial use, and that another permit would need to be requested if the user so requires to visit the Underground again. I would also like to let known that it was not in my decision to have all these restrictions made, but it has been requested by the government that we restrict access to the Underground until they determine it is safe for humankind to visit. These visas have been given for the sole sake of having both of Frisk's parents well-informed over their child's journey, and said adults' safety should be provided by mister Serif. Any danger they face at the Underground shall be blamed on him for his inability to keep up with the requirements of this agreement, which include providing (miss/mister) (L/N) specifically with both protection and knowledge alike. A second permit has been provided in case that Frisk's other parent decides to accept the offer, as well. – Asgore Dreemurr."

Below all that is a note written with a soft shade of pencil graphite, allowing you to erase it after reading.

"take care, pal."

Ignoring the smile on your face, you proceed to the third item: two admission tickets for what's titled as 'A Spectacular Drama by Mettaton'. Attached to one of them is a second sticky note along with a shorter memo written down on it. It makes sense as to why the agreement letter had a 'take care' on it, given it's the last item you'd pulled out besides the money. Had you checked them all in that order, that last memo would've been a closing of sorts. 

"there's gonna be a big show in two months. dunno if you and your kid celebrate the holiday, but frisk seemed to like snowdin, so i figured they'd also like seeing a whole bunch of events related to that. it says 'drama' only, but that's just mettaton highlightin' what he finds the most important."

"tell me when the time comes if you're up for it. i can help you get to know the guy better before then."

The money's the only thing left and the only one that leaves questions behind. You take the batch and count in hopes of finding some answers, though the longer you do that, the stranger it gets.

20…

40…

60…

80…

100…

That pattern repeats for two more times, making it three-hundred in total. 

Just as you wonder why you've been handed such a large amount, you have the urge to look at yourself in the coffee table's reflection to see you're not exactly looking any better than before.

Both him and his brother had noticed that. It's almost been two weeks, and yet you've still the same tired look to your face. Constant lost hours of sleep, excessive stress, and practicing a poor diet had left almost irreparable damage on your body and mind alike, enough for even non-human people to notice the change. 

All things considered though, how were you supposed to hate an enemy when they acted like this?

[First] | [Previous] | [Next]

• • •

Happy Holidays!

I know times are tougher than ever, but stay strong and remember to practice social distancing if you're making small get-togethers with family/those in your same household, apartment, or campus.

Take care, and stay safe. :-)

(Holiday special incoming soon enough!!)

Tag List

@the-simp-express

(This is a temporary format until I learn more about Tag Lists! I'm a Tumblr noob, lol.)

#sans x reader #undertale x reader #lgbt #lgbt themes #gender neutral reader #male reader #female reader #mother reader #father reader #parent reader #chubby reader #long fic #romcom #adventure #mystery #platonic relationships #slow burn

[therealnotta]

UNDERTALE IS INHERENTLY A GAME ABOUT PEOPLE STUCK IN A TIME LOOP ACTUALLY AND MILLENNIA COULD HAVE PASSED UNDERGROUND WITH ONLY A FEW DAYS PASSING ON THE SURFACE

this is a theory post with shoddy evidence, reader beware

Alright, first off, let's state the obvious. You can reset the game. Reloading a save file counts, even if it's from you dying. several characters, at various times in the game, bring this up to varying degrees, whether it's Sans making snappy comments about how many times he's killed you or Flowey complaining that you couldn't finish the genocide run without starting over. it's a whole thing!! Bare minimum, you've trapped the underground in a weird time loop for as long as you're playing the game. This is NOT related to the barrier; you can reset after breaking it, keeping them underground.

Now, before you, Flowey had this ability; it's apparently linked to whoever currently has the most DETERMINATION in the underground at any given moment. You have more, so when you fall you wrest control from him. So, before you, Flowey was... torturing everyone. This wasn't a happy time loop, it was a wicked bad one. Flowey even tells you how he started doing that (and it sounds suspiciously like the same route someone playing blind would take). Namely, he goes out and befriends everyone, resets, befriends everyone differently, resets, etc. etc. until he gets bored with them. then he starts killing people to see what would happen. In a lot of these timelines, Sans steps up and puts a stop to it, but in a lot of them he doesn't. Flowey specifically says that the person it took him the longest to "get bored of" was Papyrus. This is... kinda messed up? Like, the game usually gets pretty dark, but having a character admit they were torturing people and then mention that they spent the most time with the character who tends to trust and believe people LITERALLY until death, that's... yikes. But if we've established that the game itself is a time loop, then this was a time loop, too.

Now, here's where it's a little shaky. First, humans have an insane amount of DETERMINATION and Flowey was injected with a small portion of that; if any human fell down after Flowey woke up for the first time, he wouldn't have any power until that human died. He resets pretty quickly the first time, all things considered, so the time loop doesn't start until every other human soul has been collected. There's no telling how quickly that happened, but it's been a long time since; few people alive have even seen a human. They don't recognize you as one, for the most part. But if everything's locked in a loop by Flowey, how did Frisk get there?

One possibility is that, you know, Flowey waited longer than usual to reset. The Underground is pretty closed off; it's not like there'd be any butterfly effect or anything. But if he just waited a little longer one day, maybe he was just resetting RIGHT when Frisk was about to fall. But what kind of run was it when you fell, then? Flowey is back, close to Chara's grave. No one is dead. Papyrus is friends with him, but that's the only thing that Flowey has affected; it's been enough time that Papyrus is starting to feel bad about himself and Sans has started trying to figure out why his brother keeps talking about talking flowers, but nothing major has happened. I'm sure that if it had been left alone he would've ended up seriously messing up Papyrus, but I HIGHLY doubt it was as long term of a run as, say, the one where he befriends everyone. It's likely shorter. If that's the case, then Frisk would HAVE to have been outside the range of the loop. Then they fell, got caught up in it, and specifically got caught up in CONTROLLING the loop. Which is wild.

anyway yeah, everyone has been trapped in a hellish nightmare for an undisclosed period of time. you're not just freeing them from the underground, you're theoretically freeing them from the loop, too.

#undertale #theory #long ish #papyrus #flowey #time loops lol #sans

[keelywolfe]

FIC: Welcome to Backwater ch.14 (spicyhoney)

Summary: Hey, Stretch might hate to see Edge leaving, but he sure does love to watch him walk away.

~~*~~

Read ‘All In The Jeans’ on AO3

or

Read it here!

~~*~~

Stretch let Edge lead him outside, towards the winding front walkway. But instead of heading down the stone path to where Stretch’s bike was sitting there like a steampunk nightmare invading their gingerbread fairytale, he drew Stretch down to sit on the front steps of the porch. The bricks were soothingly cool beneath him in the waning heat of the day and Edge sat next to him, his knee bumping lightly against Stretch’s.

“You don’t have to rush off just yet,” Edge told him quietly. “There’s still some time before sunset.” He still had a hold on Stretch’s hand and a bony thumb rubbed gently across the backs of his knuckles. “But you looked like you needed some air.”

“yeah,” Stretch agreed, numbly. He stared down at yard in front of him, the riotously colorful flowerbeds amidst rocky outcroppings that led their way up the little hill to the house. It was a little cooler here in the woods out of the stark sun overhead in town, closer to another season than summer or so it felt to him. It was all so inviting, welcoming, and his first thought upon seeing it that this was a trap of some sort seemed a little insulting now that he’d been fed and released. He’d eaten Red’s food, hell, moved right into his home without a qualm, and a well-kept cabin in the woods was where he drew the line?

But then, it wasn’t the house where the real problems lay, was it, it was the people living in it.

Monsters and a Human from another multiverse, again, and not just any Monsters, but another set of mirror images here in the Aboveground. He’d been worried about a Stephen King effect around this place and it turned out he should’ve been more concerned with Isaac Asimov, ‘cause the shift from gothic horror to sci-fi was not one he’d been braced for, with a ‘little invasion of the body snatchers’ vibe tossed in for extra flavor.

Only, that wasn’t fair, was it. Doppelgängers, Edge had mentioned earlier almost like it was a joke, but it was true, just like Sans and Papyrus were and he’d adjusted to them okay. It hadn’t been easy hanging out with someone who wore his brother’s face, but he’d adjusted. And despite the somewhat otherworldly location, these guys had been nothing but kind to Stretch, kinder than the Humans who’d greeted them when they’d popped out from the mountain, for sure.

Hell, Red took him in like a mama dog adopting a stray kitten. The glossy veneer of Stretch’s knowledge-dump panic was cracking and with it his weird sense of numbness, the void it left behind filling with dawning horror.

They were the only three who got out, Frisk said, they’d lost everything and everyone, and fled all the way here, and Stretch was the one about to have a panic attack about it. Exactly what kind of asshole was he trying to be here?

When Sans and Papyrus showed up under similar circumstances, he and Blue opened their lives and homes to them, all tea and sympathy. Well, mostly the tea was from Blue, but still. He was out here in Backwater crying in his soup over a breakup and he couldn’t even dredge up some compassion for versions 2.0?

“i’m sorry,” Stretch blurted thoughtlessly. He turned his hand in Edge’s, shifting to grip his slender fingers tightly. Bare bones against bare bones, weirdly intimate for all that they were only holding hands. He didn’t think he’d ever touched another skeleton like this except his own brother, back when he was little and Stretch was still trying to keep him from running off after every other damn shiny thing he ever saw.

Holding Edge’s hand was a lot different than trying to hang on to his squirmy wormy little brother. Edge only held on just as tight, his brow bone furrowing. “You don’t need to apologize, it’s a lot to take in. You’re honestly taking this all much better than I expected. Theorizing about a multiverse is a great deal different than being confronted with living specimens.”

“no, not that. i get that. i mean—i’m sorry.” Stretch waved his free hand around them vaguely, trying to indicate the entire world with one helpless gesture, “for everything. it must’ve been rough.”

Yeah, nice to see that Stretch’s gift for understatement hadn’t been affected by his personal traumas. Rough was a really great way of describing being the only survivors of their entire world. Next, he’d describe water as slightly damp, maybe fire could be ‘a little burny’.

Edge’s expression cleared, a certain tightness forming around his sockets. “Ah.” He looked away, eye lights rising to the sky where scattered pools of blue showed through the leafy branches. His eye lights were the orangey-red glow of a banked campfire, the crack running through his left socket lent him a sort of strangely thoughtful look. “It’s all right, it was a long time ago for us.”

“about ten years, right?” Stretch winced inwardly, yeah, sure, keep on talking about his painful past, that was a great payback for a yummy dinner. “i mean, that’s what i got from the book you gave me.”

“Yes,” Edge agreed. He didn’t seem to mind talking about it, maybe time really did pad on the emotional distance; Stretch’d have to check back on his own history in a couple years, give his memories a poke and see what bruises came back. “A third of my lifetime.”

Huh. If the math was right, that actually put Edge as a little older than him, who would’ve thunk it, the little brother mythos tipped on its axis, just for him.

Edge slanted a considering glance his way. “We knew other Monsters came to the surface. I kept tabs on the news from the world outside Backwater, just in case—” he hesitated and whatever awful scenario he was thinking about got lost in a shrug. “Well. Just in case. We saw you and your brother on the news with the other Human, and realized you were from a different Underground. They referred to you as Papyrus and Sans then and before you ask, we’d already changed our names before you came to the surface. When we came to this town, actually, and if you ask me why, I wouldn’t be able to tell you. Sometimes in Backwater, certain things simply make sense. One day, everyone started calling me Edge and that’s who I’ve been since.”

He stretched his long legs out in front of him, his slim, bare feet next to Stretch’s grubby sneakers. Edge’d changed out of his grimy gardening clothes before dinner into a fresh t-shirt, still only plain black but the way it clung to his ribcage and along the line of his broad shoulders was worth a second look. His jeans, too, and Stretch was hyper aware of his own baggie shorts and t-shirt that declared he was the taco king of Minnesota, of the differences between them.

“so you already knew about me,” Stretch said, “i mean, before i got here.” There was an unfair advantage if he’d ever heard one.

“In the abstract, yes,” Edge shrugged. “It didn’t seem very important until you showed up in my brother’s living room and tried to hit me with a lamp.”

Fair. Stretch looked back at their feet, at the visibly healed cracks in Edge’s metatarsals, nothing at all like his own undamaged bones. He understood the multiverse theory, wasn’t exactly that complicated. In theory, he and Edge were different version of the same person, each another facet to a complex jewel; that was the theory, anyway. After hanging out with Sans and Papyrus, Stretch had a few theories of his own and the most important one was one he wanted to be sure Edge understood.

“you aren’t really me, you know that, right? not me me.” It seemed important to him that Edge knew that or maybe Stretch had it backwards, maybe it should be that he wasn’t Edge, since Edge was here first by several years. He sort of had dibs, didn’t he.

For some reason, that statement made one corner of Edge’s mouth curled up in a smirk. “That seems rather obvious,” Edge said dryly. “For one, as fascinating as you seem to find my jeans, you wouldn’t fit in them very well.”

“no!” Stretch sputtered, holy shit, abort, abort, do not look at his hips right now, do not do it, “i mean in the context of the multiverse! like how chara and frisk are alike, right? they look alike, but believe you me, chara ain’t like frisk. you and me, we might’ve had the same names once, but we aren’t the same, not really.”

“Chara and Frisk have some ten years of distance between their ages that might account for that,” Edge pointed out, “but I’m no scientist, not even on the weekends. It isn’t me you should be discussing this with.”

Then who…? “i’ve got some data to back it up, i’ve met someone else from another multiverse, you know. two someones, other versions of…well…us.”

Well, now, looked like it was Edge’s turn for a shock, how about that, nice to see it on someone else’s face for a change. “You have?”

“yeah. another set of Sans-and-Papyrus skeleton brothers ended up with us before we ever got the surface. they wanted to stay out of the news and the queen let ‘em.” Stretch shrugged, “i don’t know all their story, they don’t like to talk about it. but it’s been a couple years since they showed up and we definitely aren’t very similar past being skeletons and having brothers.” For one, Blue might not cook as well as Edge, but at least his spaghetti never landed anyone in the hospital with acute food poisoning like some other skeletons who would not be named coughpapyruscough.

But Edge didn’t seem interested in another set of skeleton brothers to add to the collection, not even in the interest of making a full six-pack. He’d shifted to his knees and faced Stretch, his sockets wide, “There’s another Human that fell, then? Into their Underground?” Edge asked, urgently.

“probably, but not that came with them,” Stretch shook his head, “i. uh. i get the feeling their story is a little like yours, only more so and a lot more recent.”

That urgency faded. “Ah.” Edge settled back to sit on the step again. “I see.”

Stretch didn’t ask why Edge was so interested in there being another Human kid, that was a surefire way to wander off the path, but he made a mental note about it. “what i’m getting at is, you knew who i was when you first saw me. what i was.”

“I’m hardly going to mistake the framework of my own face.”

Yeah, see, that was another mark in the column of the differences between the ‘verses not simply being nature vs nurture, but them being different people entirely despite the whole names-and-also-skeleton thing, ‘cause Stretch had been looking at his own face in the mirror for a long damn time and he didn’t look like Edge, fuck no, he’d be the first person to know if he was that gorgeous.

Probably better not to bring that up. “and you guys have been here on the surface for ten years now, taking care of the town, and you never tried to contact anyone?”

Edge only shrugged. “What was the point? It isn’t as if we actually knew any of you. I expected that more Monsters would find us eventually and you did.”

“yeah, by accident.”

Edge slanted him another look, coolly raising a browbone, “You’ve been in Backwater a little while now. Do you truly believe you’re here completely by accident?”

Yeah, okay, that was a pretty good point. “but if you were expecting other monsters to show up eventually, then why didn’t you want me to stay?”

“Maybe because my brother was very quick to adopt a person who is wearing something like my face?” That stung and Stretch looked away, his fingers going helplessly stiff in their shared grip. “Or maybe because the longer you stay, the less likely you’ll be able to leave,” Edge sighed. “That’s how Backwater is.”

“wait.” Hold on, back that up. “you can’t leave?”

“I didn’t say that.” Yeah, and that was a backpedal if Stretch ever heard one. “Frisk has willingly tied their life to this town, and I’m sworn to protect them. I can hardly do that from another city.”

“but nothing is physically stopping you from leaving.” Because if the corn was gonna sprout little legs and come after him if he drank the water here too long, that would be important information to have.

“Where would I go?” Edge countered. “Back to Ebott? Unlike my brother and I, you have ties there. We do not and I’ve very little interest in revisiting the mountain ten years away from it. I have everything I’ve ever needed right here and as for wants, I’ve long since accepted the truth.”

There was a certain bitterness there and Stretch should let it go, he’d already poked that wound enough. He should, but he still ended up asking, softly, “what truth?”

“That sometimes people don’t get what’s coming to them.” The words were so loaded that Stretch winced and hunched down, almost expecting to hear a gunshot. Instead, Edge sighed, let his anger go on an exhaled breath and he sounded calmer as he asked, “Now you’ve heard my secrets. What about you?”

“me?” Stretch snorted. He kept his gaze on the flowerbeds, tracing the flat round stones of the path, and did not meet Edge’s crimson gaze. “heh, you guys are determined to ferret something out, aren’t you. i keep telling you, i don’t have any secrets. my boyfriend dumped me, and it brought me down, couldn’t get past it, so i left town. ended up here…i should be writing this down, it’s like the start of a country song. shame i don’t have a truck.”

“You’d look terrible in a cowboy hat. And your soul?” Edge asked, gentle but implacable.

“that’s not a secret,” Stretch muttered, “i just don’t want to talk about it.” He’d talked about it plenty back in Ebott, for all the good it did him, and he’d hoped to leave those chats behind when he got on the bus.

“Fair enough,” Edge tugged on his hand suddenly, pulling Stretch to his feet, “Come on.”

He barely gave Stretch a minute to catch his balance before he started to run, heedless of his bare feet as Stretch stumbling on after him. His brief, absurd surge of fear that they were, ‘oh, fuck, running from something,’ faded as Edge laughed aloud, pulling him past trees and through flowerbeds, around the corner of the house into the backyard again. Off to the side of the garden beneath a large tree was a massive pile of fallen leaves in a messy sprawl of browns and golds, and Stretch only realized what Edge intended when it was too late to stop him, barely stuttering out a “wait--!” before he leapt and yanked Stretch along with him.

They landed together in a cacophony of brittle crunching and the blinding, whispering surge of leaves launching into the air. Stretch sputtered and flailed, wallowing in the pile that was somehow soft and weirdly crisp at the same time, billowing around him as he floundered.

Somehow, he managed to find out which way was upright again and burst out on the surface, swimming through leaves, and through the madness, he could hear Edge laughing, that deep, rich voice sharing out happiness. For the first time in what felt like an endless dry spell, his soul felt like it was full, joy pouring into it, filling up the empty space in his chest.

“you’re crazy,” Stretch laughed, spitting out a leaf, and watched as Edge flopped back in the leaves, arms and legs moving and sending up another wild swirl of crunchy browns and golds.

“Perhaps,” Edge called, raising his voice over the cronch. “But I made you smile.”

“the technique could use work, but i can’t argue with the results.” He looked up and for the first time, Stretch noticed that not all the trees here were loaded with green. His grin slowly faded. “the leaves are falling.”

“Yes,” Edge’s smile eased down, understanding dawning, and he shuffled through the leaves to Stretch, reaching for him, “It’s a late summer heat right now, but yes. The corn is ripe, autumn is coming and soon.”

Autumn was coming, too fast, and there was nothing Stretch could do to stop it, but that didn’t mean he had to let it go. He was a little sick of letting things just happen around him and Backwater was getting him into the habit of doing something about it. “i want to see edgar allen again. you think if i went back to the field, the corn would give me a pass?”

“I think that a visit can be arranged without that being an issue.” Between the two of them, they managed to wade out of the pile onto solid ground, both of them shedding leaves as Edge headed back into the garden. He skirted the wall of sunflowers, leading Stretch deeper into the rows. Right into a small patch of corn, the tips of the leaves already yellowed and curling.

Stretch stopped abruptly, his sneakers sinking into the soft soil as he stared, “is that…?” In the middle of the little field there was a scarecrow hanging from a crossbar. It looked exactly like Edgar Allen, from the greasepaint face down to the plaid shirt, only now, there was a scarf looped around his neck, the very same one Stretch left in offering.

“It is,” Edge agreed softly. “He is every scarecrow. They awaken when needed or summoned.” He gave Stretch a nudge, hard enough for him to stumble forward a step deeper into the field. “Talk to him. That’s what you wanted, isn’t it?”

Talk to him. Right. Stretch swallowed hard, trying to shuffle aside his sudden misgivings. His voice creaked like a rusty hinge as he managed a weak, “edgar?

Then he watched, fascinated. He could nearly see the life filling those limp limbs, the burlap sack of his head lifting as he raised it, and he knew the exact moment Edgar caught sight of Stretch in front of him.

“Well, hey pal! Good ta see ya!” That croaky voice was the same as Stretch remembered and he smiled helplessly, watching Edgar unwind an arm from the bar that held him up to touch the bandana around his neck, “Wanted ta thank ya for the new gear!”

“it looks good on you,” Stretch managed. The turkey-red fabric was bright against the faded plaid of his shirt and Stretch wondered how long it would take for the sun to bleach it out. Would there even be time before Edgar…ended? Did his clothes vanish with him or was he left out in the field to rot after his seasonal duty? He didn’t know and found he didn’t want to ask. For fuck’s sake, Stretch barely even knew the guy, if he was a guy, and still his soul heavy with sorrow.

“Corn thought so, too,” Edgar Allen said gleefully. “Nattered on ‘bout it for hours. Kept me awake for an age, I tell ya.” For all that his face never changed from that greasepaint sneer, Stretch could almost feel the sudden surge of sleepiness rising in the air, the way Edgar took hold of his support again, and slumped back down, “Still restin’ up from it. Thanks, again. See ya around, pal, give me a call if ya need me?”

“i will,” Stretch said and as he watched, that animation faded, life seeping away and leaving behind a nothing but straw-filled bundle of clothes.

A gentle hand settled on his shoulder and Stretch turned to look at Edge, trying to swallow down the thickness of absurd grief in his throat. He’d met Edgar Allen for a total of ten minutes, tops, and it still hurt.

“It’s difficult for him to stay awake when he isn’t needed,” Edge told him softly.

“yeah,” Stretch managed, blinking hard, his sockets aching. “he’ll be dying in a few weeks.”

“Yes, for the season,” Edge agreed, “It’s not really a death, but it is something like it.”

“that sucks, big time.” He understood it, sure, the whole ghost of gyftmas present sort of visit. Didn’t make it suck any less.

“He’s earned his rest and his spirit will return. Perhaps in the spring you can came back to Backwater and meet his recreation.” Edge held out a hand and after swiping angrily at his sockets, Stretch took it, folding their fingers together again. “Come on, it’s starting to get dark.”

It was, Stretch saw dismally, the sunlight creeping through the trees faded and soft with oncoming dusk. He’d already been here a helluva lot longer than he’d meant and it might be an interesting trip back to Red’s if he didn’t hurry; he’d be wandering off the path simply because he couldn’t see the damn thing and he really didn’t feel up to testing the monster bear theory, not today.

The two of them hurried their way back around front. He’d left his bike on the side of the driveway and before Stretch could reach it, the hand in his that had been faithfully leading him all afternoon betrayed him. Suddenly, Stretch found himself yanked around, a tree trunk hard beneath his back.

He looked up with wide sockets and all he could see Edge looming in front of him, stark crimson eye lights boring into his own and arms braced against the tree on either side of him. They weren’t touching, not quite, but he was close, so close Stretch could feel the warmth pouring off of him and it was ridiculous that it made him shiver in the waning heat of the day, an uneasy trill tickling its way up his spine. Something that was not fear was swelling inside him, not fear at all.

“What is it about you?” Edge said abruptly. His eye lights were burning, bright coals in his dark, narrowed sockets.

“what do you—” Stretch started, too weak and a little lost.

He broke off on a confused sound as Edge leaned in suddenly, tried to jerk back but there was nowhere to go as Edge murmured close to Stretch’s audial canal, his breath damp, nearly as solid as a physical touch, “If you think I haven’t noticed your attraction to me, you may wish to redefine the word subtle.”

“uhhhh.” Not that it wasn’t true but getting called out on it right now was a little unexpected, hell, he hadn’t even been looking at Edge’s ass this time. Any reasonable answer slipped away from his fumbling reach. “that’s…i mean…”

“It’s not that you’re unappealing, but as you’ve said several times, you’re getting over a breakup.” A gentle thumb slid along his cheekbone in defiance of what Edge was saying, making Stretch suck in a sharp gasp of breath.

‘Not unappealing.’ Wasn’t exactly a glowing endorsement but eh, reviews didn’t always match the product.

“yeah,” Stretch said inanely. “yeah, i am.” As if that meant anything, as if he could even think of anything outside this singular moment. Edge was so close to him, the lines of their bodies separated by bare inches as Stretch breathed out a faint, “sorry.”

He didn’t even know what he was apologizing for.

“I’m not. You aren’t alone in this,” Edge exhaled a soft half-laugh. “I’ve felt an attraction to you since the moment you tried to hit me with that damn lamp. But that doesn’t mean it’s a good idea.”

“yeah, uh,” Stretch swallowed hard, trying to add some starch to his voice, but it was so damned hard (fuck, don’t think that, don’t, shuffle that pun right to the end of the queue). Edge was so close, and the bark of the tree was rough through the back of his t-shirt, lighting digging into his ribcage like a goad, urging him to move, to step forward, to complete that circuit. Stretch didn’t move. “i mean, the way the multiverse theory goes, i’m sort of you. or you’re me. something like that.”

A low chuckle filled the air between them and Stretch closed his sockets, holy fuck, that voice rumbled through him like a miniature earthquake, “That isn’t what I meant at all. You don’t want to talk about your past and that’s fine. But that doesn’t mean the effects don’t linger.” The very tip of Edge’s nasal nodule brushed the side of Stretch’s skull as he sniffed delicately, his warm breath gusting.

Slim fingertips came to rest on his sternum over his damage soul and that single light touch affected him more than the entire groping session in the library. “I can smell your pain, such a deep hurt in your soul. I don’t want to make it worse.”

“edge,” Stretch whispered, closed his sockets against the answering whisper of his own name. There was the slightest pressure of a knee against his own and the temptation was there to spread his legs, to give it a place to rest, and he shouldn’t, they shouldn’t, but that warning voice was getting softer, distant, caught by a shepherd’s hook and hauled off the stage. He’d gone through half a dozen shocks since he woke up this morning, added them to the pile he'd gotten since he’d stepped off that bus. What was one more?

“I know all of that. I know it. So why am I so drawn to you?” Edge murmured distractedly, “What is it about you? Why can’t I leave you alone?” He reeled back, shaking his head as if to clear it, then, nearly pleading, “Don’t let me hurt you.”

A warning, a plea tangled together as one, and Stretch lurched after him, arms reaching with purely reckless intent, “you won’t, you aren’t, don’t go—"

The sudden klaxon of a horn made them jerk apart, Edge stumbling back and putting space between them. Stretch looked up see a rusty old pickup truck making its bumpy way down the path, coming to a stop with a wheezy squeal of brakes.

They watched it together, Edge with tight annoyance creasing his face and Stretch with panting confusion, struggling to get his breathing under control. It turned out to be a hell of a lot easier when the window rolled down the window and Red poked his head out, like getting doused with a bucket of ice water as he called with deliberate cheer, “hey, you two.”

“Brother,” Edge said, the greeting coming from between clenched teeth.

“you have a car?” Stretch asked, outraged. Shame was taking a hasty backseat because holy shit, he’d spent all afternoon on that bike when Red already had a set of wheels?

Red only grinned, a slash of a smile with his golden tooth winking in the dwindling light. “nah, i got a truck.”

“you never said!”

“you never asked,” Red countered. “it was gettin’ late and i got worried. didn’t want ya trying to scooter your way home in the dark, ya didn’t add a headlight to that rustbucket. toss the bike in the back and hop in.”

It wasn’t a question and yeah, somehow, he didn’t think Red was gonna buy that he and Edge were only talking, not this time.

Stretch felt a guilty flush heat his cheekbones, meekly obeying. It was for the best, he told himself, holy shit, yes, he should be grateful that Red showed up when he did, no matter what kind of protest his crotch was currently bleating up at him. The last thing he needed right now was any other attachments and not only because he felt like getting into another relationship right around never, (yeah, never worked for him) and rebound sex with the boss’s little brother was supposed to be off the table.

Getting into anything past friendship with Edge was a Bad Idea all the way around, ‘cause when it came down to it, Edgar Allen wasn’t the only person leaving, now was he. Stretch didn’t want to think about it, kept trying to avoid it, but the knowledge still came up in the back of his head, readying itself to bite him in the ass.

Eventually, Stretch was gonna have to find his own way home.

~~*~~

tbc

#spicyhoney #papcest #keelywolfe #underfell #underswap #underfell papyrus #underswap papyrus #welcome to backwater

[thenamesseven]

Word count: 3.9k

Warnings: Nothing in this chapter!

A/N: Here is another chapter! The first one got so many likes, I didn’t know you all would like this story so much ^^ Anyways, thank you for supporting it and I hope you enjoy reading this one too!

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Entering one by one, the inmates made their way into the shower room. After waiting for some minutes and allowing the guard by the door to frisk him, Jongho finally walked into the shared showers where everyone cleaned themselves at the same time, or at least, that's what everyone from outside thought they did. 

At the beginning, when he had only spent his first nights locked in this prison, he used to hate this time of the day. He had numerous reasons that would explain his dislike but only two of them could be highlighted. 

The first one was something he noticed as soon as he stepped into this room for the first time, the lack of privacy. Jongho was not an introverted person but he wasn't an exhibitionist either. He had always considered himself as somebody very intimate and private, only selected people had seen him fully naked and those had simply been one nightstands that he never had to see again.

Don't misunderstand this though, insecurities had nothing to do with this. His self-esteem has always been good enough to make him feel confident and Jongho had never disliked himself, in fact, he was pretty happy with his own physique. 

However, when he had to walk into a room full of strangers absolutely naked, Jongho had felt the need to hide himself for the first time. He wasn't intimidated, most of the guys here were in a worse state than he was but it was the way their eyes scanned his muscles, the way some of them whistled when he walked past them what had always creeped him out about this moment of the day. 

The second reason was more obvious. They were left alone in the showers, guards always waited outside by the door in case something happened. Although Jongho had witnessed horrible things during shower time and too little times one of the guards had been brave enough to come inside to stop it.

Someone would think showers were meant to let them relax but Jongho knew you couldn't let your guard down in a place like this. His eyes had seen too much, from dropping the soap situations to someone getting stabbed out of nowhere. After all, since the guards were out, this was the perfect occasion to hurt somebody if you wanted to.  

That could sum up some of the main reasons as to why Jongho had always hated this time of the day, no matter how hard he has tried to get used to it, he will never succeed in it. Shared showers were not meant for him but it was something he would have to deal with for so many more years. 

A sigh escaped his lips as he shook his head, this train of thoughts wasn't the most motivational one for the situation, in fact, daydreaming wasn't the best thing to do in the showers for the reasons mentioned above. Stepping aside to let his partners walk inside too, Jongho started unzipping his orange clothes in order to leave them in the dirty clothes basket. Some people were inside already and Jongho could feel some of their eyes trailing the outlines of his muscles, the lines of his tattoos, people here were truly unashamed when it came to staring.

It’s not like Jongho cared anymore though, the best way to get through this was to ignore that small feeling in his chest, the one that made him slightly disgusted. Like he usually said, the sooner he showered the sooner he would finish.

With his eyes glued to the blank wall at the end of the corridor full of showers, Jongho made his way deeper into the room with a towel on his shoulder and the bar of soap in his hands. Some of the guys he walked by whistled, some of them ignored him, Jongho just hoped nobody felt in the mood to pick a fight with him tonight, he truly wasn’t in the mood to throw some punches.

"Been working out, huh!?"

Someone shouted from his side, Jongho didn’t even stop to spare him a glance though, he simply kept walking with the only objective of getting to one of the free showers that were at the end of the room. No matter how much he wanted to ignore the guy that had complimented him, Jongho knew that would get him in trouble, so he forced a small smile up to his lips and faintly nodded his head to let the guy know he acknowledged him.

"It’s the best way to kill some time in here" He answered to nobody in particular, stopping as soon as he got the free shower that would belong to him for the few minutes he would take. There was some faint muttering when some of the guys agreed with him as he turned on the water, letting everybody know that he wasn’t up for some conversation.

Luckily everyone got the hint and went back to their respective conversations, leaving him out of them.

Some would define Jongho as an antisocial, he was not a person that socialized with everybody, in fact, he had to change his nature a little bit in order to survive in this place. As in schools, the people in prison divided themselves in different groups depending on their personality or on what they have done but Jongho had been quick to notice that loyalty wasn’t something that was spared in this place, in fact, it was something pretty rare to find. Inmates always wanted to be on the good list of the strongest one no matter what group he was in, they would betray whoever they had to for a little favor and information, gossip as Hoseok used to call it, was gold in here. 

That’s why, despite how many years Jongho had spent locked, the only person he trusted was Mingi and that was only because they were in the same gang. He knew the guy would never betray him but he couldn’t say the same about people like Yoongi or Hoseok. They were valuable friends but they always sold themselves to the best bidder.

“Jongho” 

Mingi’s voice brought him out of the small trance he had put himself into, his eyes slowly rising from the floor to meet his friend’s. Now, Mingi was usually one of the few people that somehow managed to remain happy behind bars, not because he enjoyed living in the place they were locked in but because he prefered staying positive. It helped him get through the boring routine of their everyday life.

“Mingi!” 

Hoseok was quick to follow him, both of them taking the showers near Jongho’s so the three of them could participate in the conversation. Mingi glared at their interruption, frowning softly, letting the male know he really wasn’t interested in whatever gossip he was about to spill but Hoseok ignored him, not walking away.

Guess whatever Mingi had to say would have to wait until they were alone.

“Are you guys signing up for The Ring?” He asked, Mingi rolled his eyes and turned back to face his shower obviously frustrated and not willing to talk about this. “I’ve heard they’re looking for some new fighters since some of them have….”

“We’re not interested in that” Jongho cut him off quickly, The Ring was definitely something Mingi and he didn’t need in their life, no matter how many privileges the guards gave you, they both knew it wasn’t as worthy as it sounded.

“Jaehyun might join” Hoseok said, eyes carefully trained on Jongho since he knew they didn’t get along well “Thought that if one of you joined it could make things pretty interesting, you know, since your gangs are-”

“We’re not getting in The Ring Hoseok” Mingi intervened this time, voice serious and deep, lowkey threatening him in case he decided to insist “Whoever told you we were interested was wrong, look for someone else” Jongho nodded quietly to his friends words, getting rid of the soap that he had spread on his skin and hair as Hoseok simply stared at them quietly.

“Well, if you guys hear of somebody that is interested you know where to find me”

Hoseok then proceeded to walk away, leaving the two friends alone once again. Mingi watched their surroundings, making sure there was nobody dangerous nearby that could hear him and Jongho talk before opening his mouth again.

“I was at the-”

Two loud knocks interrupted him, making Mingi sighed in frustration since that sound meant it was time for them to get out of the shower and start their daily duties.

Guess what Mingi had to tell him would have to wait for a bit longer.

Most of the day passed uneventfully, it was rather calm and you didn’t have anything better to do than keep rearranging your entire workspace, it almost looked like a new place and you couldn’t be happier with the result. 

You got rid of the old and worn out curtains that had been covering the only source of natural light the infirmary had, the window was not too big and the bars behind the glass didn’t make it too cozy but you still thought it was better to leave it uncovered. Thanks to Mingi, the two of you had managed to make the blood stains on the walls disappear with a method he seemed to know pretty well, you never asked how he knew of it, you were sure you didn’t want to know the answer to that question. You also cleaned the entire room, there wasn’t any dust on the furniture anymore and everything smelled like clean. Some of your titles that you achieved in your student years hung on the wall and a family picture along with a cactus you adored decorated your new desk, you didn’t know if you were allowed to bring that kind of stuff into the infirmary but you had already done it. Since everything was cleaned enough, you only had to make a list of the materials and medicines you would need. Some of them had been in the cabinets but were already expired and others were needed to be bought, hopefully there weren’t too many, despite your boss saying he would buy you whatever you needed, you felt a bit bashful to start asking for stuff.

You were scribbling down the name of an ointment you would surely need in case one of the inmates burned themselves when a couple of knocks broke the silence of the room. Mingi informed you yesterday that he wouldn’t be able to help you out today because he had some activities to do, even though he was supposed to work with you, he was still an inmate and he had a schedule to follow, so you were slightly curious to see who was opening your door at the moment.

Maybe this would be your first patient? 

What you honestly didn’t expect was Wooyoung, your high school friend, walk into the infirmary dressed with his guard uniform. Your heart skipped a beat, this could either complicate your plan a lot more or make it easier, it all depended on his attitude towards Jongho.

“(Y/N)” 

His voice was quiet, almost a faint whisper as if he was afraid of scaring you away if he talked too loud. Wooyung’s eyes were glued to you, scanning your features while he slowly stepped inside, he probably was as surprised as you to find you in a place like this, Wooyoung knew you well enough to know working in a prison was way out of your comfort zone. 

“H-Hey” 

You stuttered, standing up from the floor to place the list you had been making on your desk. As soon as the paper abandoned your hand, Wooyoung reached out and tugged on your wrist hard enough to bring you closer to his body, wrapping his arms around you.

Things between the two of you had never been easy, Jongho always said Wooyoung wanted to be more than a simple friend and despite you laughing as if he was joking, you had also noticed the way he looked at you, the way he used to be so gentle and careful around you and how your opinion was the only one that mattered to him. This was also the reason why he and Jongho never got along, your childhood friend never liked him completely, Jongho never trusted Wooyoung like you did and he never hid it. Wooyoung only saw Jongho as an obstacle, he always thought he was the reason why you would never date him.

Maybe he was right.

This wasn’t the time to think about this anyways. Jongho and you were never able to date because he went to jail and when that happened, you isolated yourself and only dedicated your time to try to find the way of getting him out of jail legally, letting the friendship you and Wooyoung had get cold.

“When I saw the name of the new nurse I couldn’t believe it was you!” Wooyoung moved back enough to allow his eyes to scan your face once again, almost as if he couldn’t believe the two of you had crossed paths after so many years. A soft blush made its way up to your cheeks, the corner of your lips tilted upwards. “I mean, it’s been so long...And you’re just...You”

You couldn’t help but chuckle at his words, not surprised by what he said “Yeah, still boring old me” Your reply made him frown but you shrugged nonchalantly.

“I meant you still look beautiful, you idiot” He flicked your forehead, not leaving you time to be stunned at his blunt confession. Wooyoung had always been like this, he was never shy when it came to complimenting you, not even when people were around and that was something that always got on Jongho’s nerves. 

“And you’re still so brown-nosing” You replied jokingly, rolling your eyes playfully as he chuckled “I kind of missed it, I don’t know how my self-esteem survived without you all this years” This time the two of you laughed and for a second you forgot where you were, it honestly felt as if you were back in high school, chatting between classes with him. 

“God, I missed those days” Wooyung said with a dreamy smile, leaning back against your desk as he looked at you. He hadn’t changed one bit, if so, Wooyoung looked even more handsome now that some years have passed and he was way more mature than when you two were teenagers “When we only had to worry about exams”

“And not getting caught when we sneaked out of our houses” You added chuckling, making him smile too

“Oh god, I still remember that time my mom walked into my room right when Jongho-”

As soon as his name was mentioned, the atmosphere in the room turned cold. Despite the two of them being really good friends at the beginning, Jongho and Wooyoung were meant to not end up well, especially considering their choice of career. While Wooyoung worked to put people like Jongho behind bars, Jongho worked hard to avoid people like him.

They were destined to not like each other, life worked like that.

Wooyoung glanced at you quietly, hesitance obvious in his face “Have you seen him?” He asked quietly, hands resting in his pockets casually.

“Not yet” You replied with a small smile. However, when you realized you had walked straight into his trap your heart started beating faster but you tried to remain as calm as you could so he wouldn’t notice it.

“So you know he’s here” Wooyoung muttered quietly, arms coming up to cross on his chest. His posture didn’t look relaxed anymore and you could see the engines in his head turning, probably coming up with different theories as to why you had chosen to work in this prison out of all places “What are you doing here, (Y/N)?”

“Working” You scoffed, laughing it off as if you hadn’t noticed how tense the atmosphere was between the two of you, maybe Wooyoung hadn’t noticed either “Why do you think I’m here?” Your question made one of his eyebrows lift, he was watching you carefully, taking in every gesture you did and every word you said.

“Isn’t it a big coincidence that you started working in the prison Jongho is locked in?” Even though he was right, you couldn’t help but frown, acting offended at his indirect accusation.

“I could say the same thing about you, couldn’t I?” You instantly replied, maybe a bit too quick but at least it was enough to make him back off

“Touché” He simply replied, shrugging as his eyes moved away from you to scan the office “Nice little space you got here” His usual, easy-going smile had finally returned and you let your guard down once again, still acting defensive would only make him even more suspicious about everything.

“Yeah, I had to work my ass off to-”

Your words got cut off when Wooyoung’s walkie talkie started making some noise, you tried to listen in to what the person on the other line was saying but you couldn’t understand anything, it sounded like an entire different language. 

“(Y/N) come on” Wooyoung started walking suddenly, motioning you with his head so you would follow him “You might have some work to do after all”

Even though you hadn’t understood whatever the other person had told Wooyoung through the walkie talkie, you were guessing someone must have hurt themselves if they needed you. With a quiet nod and not asking any questions, you started following him out of the infirmary and through the different halls the prison had, some cells were empty which made you guess that it was probably the time of the day when inmates were busy doing something or outside having a break. Wooyoung didn’t say a word, he was pretty quiet and there was no way of knowing if it still was because of the small yet tense moment the two of you had or because he was simply focused in his work, keeping an eye out for the two of you.

It wasn’t until you reached the door that led to the outside area that you started feeling a bit nervous. One thing was to treat one of them in your infirmary but working out there, surrounded by them was totally something else. What if they tried any funny business?

“What happened?” You asked quietly, eyes searching the area as you tried to distract your mind.

“Someone got hurt playing basketball” Wooyoung sighed tiredly when the two of you walked outside, your eyes found the small group of inmates surrounding someone on the floor, you could hear his grunts full of pain from where the two of you were “There you have your first patient”

Despite you instantly noticed how the bone in his knee wasn’t where it should be, your eyes instantly drifted apart to the person you’ve been dying to meet since you knew you were going to work here. There, dressed in all orange and looking stronger than ever stood your childhood friend Jongho, the one that had literally saved your life. 

He hadn’t changed one bit, Jongho looked exactly like he did four years ago, although there were some black bags under his eyes and his hair wasn’t as styled as it used to be back in your high school days but for an inmate? He had managed to take care of himself pretty well in a place like this. Your stomach turned into knots as soon as you realized his attention was on you and for a second, the whole world froze around you two.

The first thing you noticed was the confusion on his face, given away by the little wrinkles that appeared on his forehead as soon as his eyes landed on you, and then his entire face changed to a surprised one. You could feel his eyes scanning you from head to toe, taking in every single detail, the smile that appeared on his face when he saw your uniform, when he realized you had finished the career you’ve always wanted to study, didn’t go unnoticed. 

And then your eyes met and you swore your heart stopped beating too.

He mouthed a silent hello that made you smile, which only made him smile bigger and suddenly you felt as if a huge weight had been lifted from your shoulders.

He was glad to see you. Jongho didn’t hate you.

You felt the need, the urge to head over where he was and wrap your arms around him, keep him close to you so nobody could ever take him away but you managed to control himself when you saw how Mingi was holding him back from doing the same. Thanks God he was responsible, getting a hug from the guy that was locked in because he killed your abusive father in front of your work mates and other inmates was probably not the best idea.

You hadn’t been careful enough though and Wooyoung had instantly noticed how you slowed down your pace when your eyes landed on him, the little smiles you sent each other were also caught by his eyes.

“(Y/N)?” Wooyoung called out your name forcing you to move your eyes away from him and back to the patient you were supposed to attend. “Is it too bad?” He asked, willing you to focus on something else.

Clearing your throat, you moved your eyes back down to the guy on the floor, his knee was definitely broken and he needed to go on a small trip to the hospital to get that fixed, there was nothing you could really do for him.

“He needs a doctor, there’s nothing a could do here” You muttered, looking down at him, feeling Jongho’s eyes on you “I could give him something for the pain but I think it’s better if we wait for the ambulance” You told him, glancing at Jongho who had moved closer to where you were.

“Alright guys, time to go back inside, no more play time for today” Wooyoung said out loud, eyes trained on Jongho before he dragged them back to you “You go back to the infirmary, we’ll take care of this” 

“Can I just-”

“(Y/N)” Wooyoung’s tone turned authoritative, letting you know he wouldn’t budge in your request just because the two of you were friends “Back to the infirmary”

And just like that, Jongho yand you were forced to go separate ways once again.

This time you had been so close though.

So close yet so far.

Tag list! : @guess--monster​ @cometoceantrenches​ @lovelyvitamin​ @daintysan​

#kpop #kpop story #kpop fanfiction #kpop fanfic #ateez #ateez smut #ateez angst #ateez fluff #ateez x reader #ateez seonghwa #ateez yeosang #ateez yunho #Ateez hongjoong #ateez mingi #ateez wooyoung #wooyoung #wooyoung smut #wooyoung fluff #wooyoung x reader #ateez jongho #jongho #jongho x reader #ateez san #jongho smut #jongho fluff #jongho angst

[valkyrieofsmut]

Captive Love   25

UF!Sans x Reader (or Frisk if you wanna)

Summary: Papyrus yells at Sans to get his shit together, but he's a mess... AKA Sans gets drunk... and remembers some things from the past... that he'd really rather not..

A/N: There is some... possibly triggering events... experiments and tiny skele abuse... little Papyrus is too cute and sweet... Also mentioned possible death. It, as usual, is separated with the ~~~ and should be (at least mostly) safe again at the next set, safe summary in the end..

Masterlist      Series Masterlist

Story

Blackout.

Sans rolled over in his bed, feeling like the scars on his chest were going to break through and destroy his soul. 

The sun blared outside, shining into his sockets. 

"fuck off," he growled, rolling back over. 

Papyrus pounded on the door, making the sounds reverberate through his skull. He couldn't tell if it was louder than normal, or it just sounded like it to his throbbing skull. 

"GET YOUR STUPID, LAZY ASS UP, SANS!! I KNOW YOU'RE IN THERE!! I KNOW YOU WENT OUT DRINKING AGAIN LAST NIGHT, LIKE THE FUCKING MORON THAT YOU ARE!! YOU'D BETTER BE DOWNSTAIRS IN FIVE MINUTES, OR I'M COMING BACK UP HERE FOR YOU!! YOUR STUPIDITY IS NO EXCUSE TO BE A LAZY DRUNK MORON!!"

 . 

The day was hell- actually, life was hell at the moment… 

His brother yelled at him about how stupid he'd been every chance he got- like he didn't already know that he'd royally fucked up. 

Every place he went reminded him of something he'd shown, or wanted to show (Y/n), her excitement at all the different things she'd never seen before had warmed his soul every time. 

Each time someone asked where his pet was made his soul thrum and ache to be close to her. ...and punch the person in the face… She was so much more than the pet they'd had to pretend she was. 

Every time he got Grillby's, he remembered her face of delight as she ate it for the first time. 

Every bite of his brother's food reminded him that she'd been there and helped him get better at cooking. 

Every time he rolled over in bed and smelled her scent caught on the pillow, or the sheets… 

And then there was the time he'd gotten back from drinking, and had been stumbling around drunk in his room, kicking random stuff on the floor, only to discover a pair of her underwear that he'd probably tossed in the corner in his haste to get to her. 

That had made him collapse in a heap of self hatred and regret. 

.

Sans sat at the table, stabbing his fork at his dinner aimlessly. 

“I MADE YOU A WONDERFUL, DELICIOUS, HOME COOKED MEAL! DON’T FIDGET WITH IT AND ACT LIKE IT’S THE TRASH YOU FILL YOURSELF WITH AT THAT GREASE TRAP,” Papyrus snapped at him. 

“sorry, boss…” 

Papyrus clenched his jaw, staring at his own fork pushing around a bite longer than necessary. 

“I WARNED YOU. I TOLD YOU NOT TO FUCK IT UP. BUT YOU HAD TO GO AND DO THE STUPIDEST THING POSSIBLE TO FUCK IT UP.” 

Sans didn’t say anything. 

“YOU DID IT TO YOURSELF.” 

“i fuckin’ know, boss!” Sans yelled, scooting his chair back from the table. “i know i’m a fuck up! it’s pretty fuckin’ obvious that i always manage ta fuck everythin’ up!” 

Papyrus sniffed haughtily. “I’M GLAD THAT YOU KNOW. WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO ABOUT IT?” 

“i can’t do anythin’ about it! i fucked up, an’ she hates me! i took ‘er back ta th' edge a th' boundary, an’ there’s no way i can ever find ‘er, now!” Sans glared at his plate of food. 'sides, she wouldn't care- not that i'm sorry for being an asshole, not that i've been tryin' ta be a better monster, an' made great progress, too! maybe only a lil before i met 'er, but her bein' here made it so much easier to be better… 

Papyrus scowled at his brother. “THERE’S ALWAYS A WAY-” 

Sans cut him off by standing up, his chair making a loud noise as it almost fell over, and started towards the door as he muttered, “i’m goin’ ta grillby’s…” 

After grabbing his coat and slamming the door after him, Sans shortcutted to the bar, intent on getting wasted. 

.

A few drinks in with a good buzz, Sans started looking around. 

He wasn’t quite drunk enough to not remember, but it was at least a bit hazy. 

“Heya, Sansy!” 

He looked over to the bar stool next to him, seeing the cream colored bunny next to him, ordering a drink. He followed her to her regular booth, and they began matching shots, seeing who could get the drunkest first. 

. 

Sans opened his eye sockets, his fuzzy eyelights looking around the bar, seeing some drunk monsters starting to be a bit more friendly with each other. 

His skull fell to the side as he shifted, realizing that he’d missed a bit of what had happened. He straightened up in the booth seat and looked down at his drink again. 

Maybe he should try to find someone… 

Even if it was a one night stand, it would be someone to try to get rid of his memory of- no… thinking her name would only start the hurt again… make his soul burn with the knowledge that he was to blame for fucking his life up beyond repair. 

But, finding someone might be a good idea; he needed to at least stop jerking off excessively to her panties, or reading those stupid, mushy, trash books he hid on his shelf while imagining that she was the leading lady- and he was lucky enough to be the bastard who’d seen the error in his ways and was given a second chance… 

… 

Sans tossed back his drink and took the half empty glass from the passed out bunny across from him, downing it as well. 

He was finally kicked out of the bar, Grillby chasing everyone out as he closed. 

Sans took a shortcut home, but ended up in the field near the echo flowers he had planted to remind him of Waterfall, where he used to look at the Underground “skys” and pretend the crystals were stars. 

He yelled loudly for a minute, then tried again, this time making it within a short distance of the house. 

He swayed dangerously, but he made it in through the door, getting to the foot of the stairs and seeing the door to the hidden room open. He went to it, hand stopping short only due to him passing out across the floor with a thud. 

His vision had gone dark. 

Darker... 

…yet darker… 

…and darker, still… 

… 

… 

… 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sans felt his soul floating above his body, unable to move as Gaster held him there with his weird powers. 

“Just hold still, you little shit…” 

Sans could handle it… as long as he left Papyrus alone, he could handle it… 

“P-PAPA…” 

“What is it? What are you doing in my lab? Why are you here?” Gaster demanded roughly in irritation. 

Sans fought as hard as he could to shift his eyelights to see his little brother. He needed to stay away! Sans wished that he could talk, yell at Paps to run, to go hide, to never come there, ever again- but he could hardly shift his eyelights. 

“WH-WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO SANS?” 

run, bro, run! Sans begged mentally. 

“Well, you see, you weak little fool, monsters are stuck underground. We’re not here because we want to be. Your useless brother here, is going to help us escape,” Gaster told him. 

“THAT’S AMAZING, SANS!” Papyrus shouted in proud joy. 

Sans tried to will his brother to leave, to save himself from the sadistic monster towering over him. 

Papyrus’s jaw hit the hard floor as Gaster smacked the back of his skull so hard he fell forward. 

“Don’t be stupid, you worthless little runt,” Gaster snapped as he tore the ragged stuffed animal from his grasp. “He’s only a part of the experiment, he’s not doing anything worthwhile.” He held up the prized toy and ripped it’s limb off. “Just like this garbage is only making you weaker.” 

“NOOO!” Papyrus cried, a heart wrenching sob that made Sans’ soul hurt. 

Gaster glared at the small skeleton on the floor. “You have no need for this trash,” he sneered. “It’s as useless as you are.” He tore at the thing until it was completely in pieces and destroyed. 

Sans wanted to punch Gaster in his stupid cracked face. 

Gaster plucked Papyrus from the floor and turned to hold him where Sans could see. “Look at how weak you’ve made him,” he gloated. “If you didn’t coddle him and try to protect him from the real world, he’d be stronger.” 

Sans could feel his magic gathering in his bones, pushing and fighting against Gaster’s hold on him. 

Gaster looked Papyrus in the socket. “You should thank your brother for this- for making you as weak as you are.” 

A shot of fear showed on Papyrus’ face before the first hit came. 

Red, hot, magical tears built in Sans’ sockets as he fought to get free, to help his brother, but he was only able to sort of flop around on the table. 

Papyrus’ cries and tears were background noise for Gaster’s cries and accusations, telling Sans that he could thank himself for his brother not being able to defend himself, telling Papyrus to thank Sans for making him so weak. His gleeful cackling mixed with the noise of the attack. 

One of the machines in the room kicked into another level, sounding like it was reversing the flow it had been using. 

“sssstttppppp…” 

“Haven’t I taught you boys anything? Emotions are weakness.” 

“sssttoppp…” 

“Weakness is unacceptable- weakness will get you dusted.” 

“sstoopp…” 

“I thought I had taught you both better- but maybe you’re just slow learners!” The thought was accompanied with a manic and near demonic grin. “Maybe you just don’t learn- maybe you need to be taught over and over and over-” 

“stop,” Sans choked out. 

Gaster was too focused on what he was doing to notice at first, but when it seemed like a circuit or fuse had blown, he paused his movements. 

Sans started shaking, his body twitching every which way as he fought, fought to be able to save Papyrus. 

He felt a power just beyond his phalanges, he could almost reach it- 

The tears in his sockets grew, starting to stream down his skull, as he stretched himself to touch it- 

The power in the lab started to flicker, and Sans felt like his soul was being ripped into tiny pieces with a cheese grater, digging into it and shredding the super sensitive entirety of his being. 

“What are you doing, you stupid fucking brat,” Gaster demanded, glaring watchfully at him, ignoring his screams of pain.

Sans couldn’t hear him, though- he couldn’t even hear the screams leaving his own mouth, he was only consumed with protecting his brother, stopping Gaster from hurting him. 

A loud crack echoed in the room, followed by the power cutting off and slowly starting back up. 

Sans felt weightless, like he had no restraints. 

He threw himself from the bed, but felt that he didn’t even touch the floor. He was held by a gathering of power- the same power that he’d tapped into. 

The power that was… 

Gaster sneered as Sans stood before him, attempting to adjust his magical hold, but it didn’t affect him. 

Sans clenched his fists and gathered the power there, ready to stop the attack on his brother, a shimmer moving around his fists. 

Gaster cackled at him and tossed Papyrus to the floor. “So, you’ve finally done what you were meant to do this whole time.” The tall monster reached for Sans, but his magic didn’t affect him. He made a displeased face at Sans before flourishing his hands, the gems in the centers of his cutout palms gleaming as he grabbed something in the air and pulled, lines attaching the two shimmering to visible for a moment. 

Gaster grinned dangerously in accomplishment and jerked the lines, making Sans stumble forward. 

“And to think; all it took to motivate you was a little smacking around of your brother… Maybe I’ll make you…” Gaster manipulated his hands in strange ways, and Sans could feel himself being tugged around by his own magic. “Yes, I could make you the one that hurt him instead… but, I think that I’ve taught him enough about the dangers of being weak… now I think I’ll teach you the dangers of caring for others-” Gaster twisted his hand and made Sans pick Papyrus up, holding him even with his eyelights. “How it can only hurt both parties in the end.” 

“i don’t wanna, pap, i swear,” Sans begged him to understand as he felt his hand being drawn back. “i swear it’s not me, paps- ya know i’d never do anythin’ like this ta ya…” 

“But it is you, Sans, look at your hand, it’s the one that’s about to hurt the one you love,” Gaster sneered from behind them. 

“‘s not- ‘s not, paps- y’re my lil bro, i love ya-” 

He was going to kill him- 

Sans was going to kill Gaster for making him do this. 

“The best part, is that the more monsters I link together, the more power I’ll have… I’ll be able to break down the barrier all on my own- as soon as I link enough souls together,” Gaster crowed in victory. 

Sans looked down to his ribcage where his soul sat, seeing a string connecting it to Gaster’s soul, a strange bond forming between his soul and the holes in his palms, the gems floating in the middles, that he’d never seen before- in fact- he didn’t think he’d ever seen this glow before on Gaster. 

Sans focused hard, letting go of Papyrus and took a hold of the line and tugged, pulling Gaster instead, turning the larger monster to him and making him stumble to be the right height, even for him to pull all the energy he could into his hands, summoning a large bone and swinging hard, hitting Gaster in the skull, seeing the flash of fear and realization just before it connected. 

Gaster fell to the ground, limp, and Sans dropped the bone, letting it disappear as he stared in shock. 

Did… Did he just kill Gaster? 

He knew he thought about it a lot… 

He knew that he wanted to do it to stop him from hurting his brother- wanted to punish him for hurting his brother… 

But… why wasn’t he turning to dust…? Why was there… blackness leaking from him?

~~~~~~~~~~

Sans turned to Papyrus when he felt a bit more certain that Gaster wasn't going to get up and attack again. 

He felt his soul twist in knots at the expression of pain and fear on his small brother's face, sure that it was partially due to the crack from his maxilla, between two sharp teeth, up and heading to his cheek bone. But the other part would have to come from… 

"b-bro-" Sans' voice caught, his hand freezing in mid motion, his phalanges starting to curl closed into a fist. “i… i’m sorry, bro,” he murmured. 

Papyrus threw himself into Sans’ arms, small, almost silent sobs leaving his small frame. 

Sans felt his soul twist again. 

“i- it’s a’right, paps- i- h-he… he’ll never hurt ya again. never…” He murmured against his brother’s skull. “i promise…”

Papyrus held tighter to him, trying to hide his silent sobs better. 

“i- imma help ya become th’ toughest monster out there. ain’t nobody gonna mess wit ya…” Sans stroked over his brother’s skull, not quite sure what else to do to comfort him. “ya- ya are th’ great an’ terrible papyrus, after all…”

Papyrus mustered up the strength to give a soft, “Nyeh Heh Heh…” 

Sans held his small form closer to his chest, curling around him. "it's ok, paps… everythin' is gonna be ok…" 

He just had to get rid of Gaster's body… 

After a moment, an idea came to him, and, thinking it through while he held and comforted Papyrus, it seemed to hold up… 

He'd hated all these years of going to the lab with Gaster, but… looks like they were finally going to be good for something. 

He didn't think anyone else knew about the void between realms that Gaster had accidentally tapped into while trying to find a way out of the Underground. 

"S-Sans…" For once, the small skeleton's voice matched his size. 

"yeah, paps?" Sans asked quietly. 

"Are… Are You Going To Be My Dad, Now…?" 

Sans felt like he was the one who'd been smacked in the back of the skull with a bone attack. 

"i- n-no, paps- i'm still yer brother, i- i ain't fit ta- i ain't old 'nough ta be a dad-” he corrected, trying to put it in a way that Papyrus would understand, “but… imma take care a ya like one, 'k? ya don't have ta be scared, imma take care a ya… i'll keep ya safe…" 

Papyrus tightened his hold on Sans. "I'm- I'm Going To Keep You Safe, Too," he murmured. 

"that's 'cause y're gonna be th' biggest, strongest monster out there. no one'll be able ta beat ya, 'cause y're th' best…" 

Sans held his brother tight, feeling the newly awakened power burning through his bones as the two held each other, swearing that they'd keep each other safe and alive, no matter what it took. 

A/N: Safe summary: Gaster is experimenting in connecting souls together, using his powers to hold Sans down, when little Papyrus comes down with his precious stuffed animal to see what they're doing. Gaster hits Papyrus as punishment for being "weak". Sans completes the connection of his soul to Gaster's to break his paralyzing hold on him and protect Papyrus. At first it works, but then Gaster uses two crystals type things (that Sans has never ben able to see before and isn't sure what they are) in the holes of his hands to focus his power and control Sans, making him hit Papyrus, as punishment for caring for and loving him. Sans tells him the whole time that it's not him. Sans regains control and stops himself, using gravity magic to bring him down to level, and then manifests a bone attack and hits him, very hard, in the head. Sans wonders if he's killed Gaster, and holds Papyrus close while trying o figure out how to hide Gaster's body. Sweet moments ensue in the mostly safe part.

#underfell sans x reader #uf!sans x you #red (underfell) x y/n #underfrick #underfluff #tsundere sans #reader insert #y/n #mutual pining #romance #angst #fluff #multi part story #Read on AO3 #past abusive relationship #Sans is sad without Reader.