#i feel perma guilt about how terrible i am at answering them and it occurred to me recently that there is a v simple solution

[colgatebluemintygel]

WE ARE SOO BACK

[kaesaaurelia]

oh hey how about Alphys and Sans' chat in your "When Life Hands You Enantiomers" fic for that fic meta ask?

OH MAN so this was my first Undertale fic ever!  I originally started noodling around with writing Sans and Alphys genfic for Yuletide, the small fandom exchange that happens every Christmas – at the time of nominations, Undertale was still a small fandom! and I got into it during the writing period, so I hadn’t thought to ask for or offer it.

I’d wanted to write a treat, but I ended up looking at all the Undertale requests and none of them quite were what I wanted to write, which was mostly chemistry puns and friendship.  So I wrote it, figured I might gift it to someone if it happened to suit their letter, and… it didn’t, really?  I figured I’d just post it.

Anyway, that’s the fic background.  Onward!

“You look like you need a break,” he said, decisively, going past her into the lab.  He paused at her desk, evidently looking for somewhere to put the box of donuts and finding nothing but her vast mountains of clutter.  "I like what you’ve done with the place,“ he said finally.

Basically this was my dad’s reaction to my first apartment every time I tried to show him how clever I’d been making furniture out of cardboard boxes.  Eventually I got sick of responding with “oh fuck off” and made him drive me to Ikea to get a desk.

“It’s, uh.  S-sorry, it’s kind of a mess.  I’m just really busy with – with Royal Scientist stuff?” she finished hopefully.  "You – you know how it is, I g-guess.“

"Yeah,” he said, tonelessly.

and this is the start of me not being able to decide whether or not Alphys remembers that Sans used to work with Gaster in some capacity in this fic!  I think I eventually decided it comes and it goes.  I like to keep things ambiguous on the topic of What The Fuck Is Even Up With Sans??? in my non-AU Undertale fics – I find the ambiguity interesting, I like that everyone has their own theories, and other people have covered that ground better and more thoroughly than I will.

“Anyway,” he said, a lot more brightly, “let’s relax and have some donuts.”  He pulled a picnic blanket from literally nowhere and spread it out on the floor of the lab.

So one of the things I appreciate about writing from Alphys’ POV is that it feels completely tonally appropriate to have her say she facepalmed, or use the phrase “literally nowhere,” and other diction I guess I associate more with informal internet communication.

“Does, uh.  Does Muffet know you made off with all her donuts?” Alphys asked.

“Eh,” said Sans, waving a hand dismissively.

Again, I really like leaving Sans’ bullshit ambiguous, and kind of shady.

“So.  You still working on that horrible tile puzzle?”

“It’s.  …yeah!  It’s going really well.  It's….”  She sighed.

“You’re stuck, aren’t you?” Sans asked.

“Yeah,” she admitted.

“You know you don’t have to do it, right?” he said.  "I mean… Papyrus knows you must be really busy, he’s not gonna be upset.  Plus, I have to say, I’m not real excited about fishing him out of the middle of it if he gets stuck on a puzzle.“

I like how Sans assumes Alphys’ real concern is letting Papyrus down.

"Ha,” she said, joylessly.  "F-funny you should mention the, uh, fishing.“

To her horror, he took this entirely the wrong way.  "Aw, come on, Undyne’s not gonna hold it against you either,” he said.

“N-no, that’s, that’s n-n-not what I –”  Words failed her and she just buried her face in her hands for a moment.

“Although, now that I mention it, Undyne did seem kinda worried about you,” he said.  "You’re not answering your phone, or something?  She said maybe you were mad at her.“

"Oh no,” said Alphys, diving for her phone.  Those four texts.  "Augh, I am the worst kind of trash, I’m a terrible friend, I c-can’t do anything right!“ she moaned.

Oh god.  Please tell me I’m not the only person who leaves texts unread because what if I forget to respond to them when the notification is gone? and then don’t ever look at them out of crushing guilt and anxiety, until people start to worry.  Please.

(Another note on diction: I actually really, really don’t like it when people call themselves “trash.”  I grew up unironically – and really shittily – using the phrase “white trash” to describe certain cousins of mine, and it’s too loaded down with those classist connotations for me to read it as just harmless self-deprecation.  This may just be because I am An Old, though.  Anyway, Alphys uses it – and it’s definitely how she actually thinks of herself – so I kind of gritted my teeth and used it too.)

Sans was managing to make a perma-grin look dismayed.

I have to say, I was impressed with the unhappy-smiling Sans sprites in the game!  I try not to ever describe Sans as frowning, but probably something’s slipped through at some point in the vrillion words of fic I’ve written.

She brought up the texts, ignoring him for the moment.

hey, was wondering if you wanna do a human history movie night with me and Pap tomorrow???

Then the next day:

super last minute, sorry.  watched Cooking w/Killer Robot marathon.  maybe next week? something w/giant swords??? YEAH!!!!!

And then:

Is everything ok?  Miss you.

And finally:

Did I do something wrong?

"Oh no,” she moaned.

“That bad, huh,” he said, sympathetically.

“Oh nooo,” she repeated.  "Oh no, oh no, now she probably thinks I’m terrible and –“

"Alphys.  Wow.  Relax,” said Sans.  "I came over to check on you and make sure you hadn’t been, I don’t know, eaten by lab rats or something.“

Sometime I really need to write the companion piece to this, where Papyrus and Undyne come up with this terrible idea for a puzzle.  And I have to work in a scene where Undyne is worried about Alphys and goes from dashing off carefully carefree-seeming texts to VERY CAREFULLY PUNCTUATED TEXTS BECAUSE WHAT IF ALPHYS THINKS SHE’S A BIG DUMB LUNK??? but it never occurs to her that Alphys might be anxious about replying to her.

"Eaten?!?” she asked.  Did he… did he know?  Augh, when had she last fed the amalgamates, anyway?  Two days ago, maybe?  Ugh, that was too long, they were going to be all grumpy when she went downstairs next.  She tried to keep breathing and not panic.

He held up his hands to pacify her.  "Hey.  Hey.  I don’t know why but everything I say’s making you panic.“  He nudged the box towards her.  "Look, have a donut.  Everything’s better with donuts.  It’ll make you feel hole again.”

Hole puns are the hole reason I included donuts in this fic.

Alphys winced despite herself, then sighed.  "Okay, yeah.  Sorry.  I’m.  It’s – it’s been a hard few days.“

"Yeah?” he asked.

She nibbled at the donut half-heartedly.  "So uh.  You mentioned the tile puzzle thing?  I’m having trouble with the piranhas.“

Sans snorted.  "I’m sorry, just  – there are piranhas?  Why are there piranhas?”

“They were in the specs Undyne gave me!” Alphys said, trying not to get defensive.

“Sounds very fishy to me,” said Sans.  "Anyway, why not just make robot piranhas?  I mean, that’s your forte, isn’t it?“

man, Alphys hasn’t told Sans about anything in this fic, and he apparently doesn’t tell her about anything either.  I like how they’re friends who lie their faces off to each other on the regular.

Oh god, robot piranhas would be about ten times worse.  "It’s not making the actual piranhas, as such,” said Alphys.  "It’s getting them to distinguish between lemon scent and orange scent.  Because, see, the request was to make sure they go after anyone who smells like oranges but be repelled by anyone who smells like lemons.“

Sans stared for a moment, and then, to her dismay, started laughing.  "What?  What?  You’re serious.  Oh man, I bet Papyrus came up with that one.  He’s – he’s pretty picky about his cleaning products, I guess that little difference is important to him.”  His grin widened a little.  "Papyrus is so great at those little details, you know?“

He’s laughing, but this praise of his brother is totally in earnest.  Sans may be the one who pays the bills, but I’m pretty sure Papyrus is the only reason their house isn’t disgusting.

"Sans, this isn’t f-funny!” said Alphys.  "Have you ever tried to train killer fish to distinguish between d-limonene and l-limonene when all they care about is smelling blood?!?  Because I have!“

"Yeah, that sounds like one l of a problem,” said Sans.  "A terrible knot you have to d-tangle.  Orange you glad I stopped by?“

"Sans,” said Alphys, beginning to lose patience.

There are several naming conventions for enantiomers, and originally this was S-limonine and R-limonine, with corresponding puns (I forget what they were, I just remember it was a pain in the ass coming up with new puns) but I think I googled and the d- and l- notation was more popular for limonene.

Like I’ve said elsewhere, this whole fic was largely an excuse for chemistry puns.

“It sounds like you need this problem like a fish needs a by… cyclohexane!  Lemon know if you think of anything I can do to help.”

“Sans,” she said.  It was starting to become more of a whine.

“Citrus me, I got this.  I don’t rind helping you at all,” he said, because he was a merciless bag of bones.

She glowered at him.  Then she took the box of donuts away from him.

CAN YOU BLAME HER THOUGH.

“Hey!  I was eating those!” he protested.

“Tough,” she said.  When he leaned over to try and reach them, she harrumphed and stood up.  Getting to his feet was apparently too much for Sans, because after one last halfhearted sitting lunge, he gave up and sat serenely on the picnic blanket.

Alphys carefully balanced the box of donuts on top of a stack of papers on her desk, then slid an empty mug underneath it for added support.

If you have never done this with a stack of papers, ….I envy your tidiness.  And if you’ve never done that dumbass thing where you try to lunge for a thing just out of your reach and then try to spontaneously develop telekinesis to bring it over to you… you’re fucking lying.

With a few keystrokes, she brought her computer out of sleep mode and was drawing up her data on the piranhas.  "I’m not really sure h-how you can help?“ she said.  "I-I mean, if you can it’d be great, obviously, b-but… don’t you do, uh, physics?”  Her memories were kind of fuzzy on this.  Why did she know Sans again?  When had she met him?  It wasn’t that important, was it?  Everyone knew Sans.

AND AGAIN, I can’t decide what Alphys knows about Sans in this fic.

“Yeah, but, everything’s physics in the end, right?” Sans said, a shrug in his voice.

She finished her donut before saying, wryly, “That’s what physicists tell themselves.  I g-guess if it helps you sleep at night…”

For whatever reason I was fortunate not to hear this much from the physics majors in school.  (The math majors, on the other hand….)  But I’ve seen them do it a lot on the internet and so I have to admit I’m kind of fond of writing chemists and biologists being dismissive about it.

“I sleep all the time,” Sans said cheerfully.  She wondered if he was ever going to get up and come over here eventually.

“Undyne has mentioned,” she said.  "So, uh, w-what exactly do you think is so physics-y here?“

"Well.  It’s not so much the physics, I guess,” he said.  "It’s just that I’m really good at cheating.“

She reached absently for another donut, opening the box without looking at it and reaching inside.  Her claws closed on something rubbery, and before she could stop, it was making a ridiculous farting noise.

She pulled the whoopee cushion out of the box, and turned to look at Sans.  He hadn’t moved an inch from where she’d left him, and was snacking on a donut he definitely hadn’t had before.

She sighed.  "Y-yeah, I can see that.”

I think at this point I’d seen a lot of Sans-being-badass art, and kind of wanted someone to react to him with an eyeroll.  Not that I don’t think Sans isn’t badass!  Just, you gotta have that one friend who will call you on your bullshit.

She turned back to her computer screen and skimmed the data she had on her attempts at training the piranhas.  Ugh.  No statistically significant difference between any of the training methods she’d attempted and the control groups.

Sometimes she wished science worked more like it was presented in fiction: less waiting around for something to happen, more moments of genius and day-saving.  On the other hand, as it turned out, horrific abominations of science were a real thing.  Who knew?

notice how I carefully avoid references to specific anime!  because I’d pretty much only watched Ouran High School Host Club in full!  I think I remember double-checking with @thinkatoryprocess that horrific abominations of science was a thing in anime?

I have since learned many things about Fullmetal Alchemist, and in particular why I wasn’t supposed to watch it just after my dog had died.

“So, h-how exactly were you thinking of cheating?”  Her mind wandered to some of those weird diagrams she’d come across deep in the lab files, presumably belonging to the previous Royal Scientist.  "Are you thinking, um, t-time travel?  Because if I could find some way to breed selectively for citrus recognition they could evolve to–“

MY THIRD INSTANCE of “what the fuck does Alphys even know?  why bother making it consistent?”

"No,” said Sans, and she leaped back with a squeak of shock, because suddenly he was standing right next to her and he was speaking in a freaky hollow voice, and also the light in his eyes had gone totally dark and, and, what the fuck, Sans?!?  "…Heh, sorry,“ he said, and the little glowing dots returned, and the grin looked more natural.  "Just.  Trust me.  Time travel, not a good idea.”

She knew she shouldn’t ask, but she kind of had to.  "…Why?“

"Time flies,” said Sans.  When she frowned at him, he added, “They’re even more annoying than fruit flies.  And they get stuck in your teeth if you go faster than light.  It’s a real problem.”

Okay, yeah, she wasn’t gonna get a straight answer out of a guy who wore bedroom slippers everywhere he teleported.  Fair enough.

This last sentence is still one of my favorite summations of Sans as a character.

“Out of curiosity,” he said, “why didn’t you make robot piranhas?”

“Ugh,” she said.  "You know, I thought about it?  B-but then I’d have to invent the scent organs and I’m n-not sure I’m up to it.“  She wasn’t up to a lot of things, honestly.  She wasn’t sure why Asgore hadn’t noticed.  Or Undyne.  She was really surprised Sans hadn’t noticed, though.  He was weirdly observant.

So I did like no research on robots for this.  IIRC machines that do something similar to smelling are a thing, but I have no idea how they work.

"Nah,” said Sans.  "Just think lazy!“

A favorite motto of my boss, weirdly enough.

"But I don’t want to leave the piranhas out!  Then Undyne and your b-brother will be d-disappointed and I won’t be the ‘g-great Dr. Alphys’ anymore, I’ll just be a f-fraud.  They s-specifically requested piranhas!”

“So give ‘em piranhas,” said Sans.  "But play to your strengths.“

"I d-don’t know that I have any strengths,” she pointed out.

“Sure you do.  I mean, right now you’ve only been using biology.  Maybe you wanna get down to the nuts and bolts of the matter.  You made Mettaton, right?” he said.  She tried not to wince.  "And if you can make that guy a star, you’ve gotta be good.  Plus, I can’t help but notice you’re, uh, pretty good with optics.“

She blushed.  "The c-cameras?  They’re for – uh, for scientific observation?” she said.

“Riiight,” said Sans.  "I know what you’re up to.  You just wanna steal all my best knock-knock jokes, don’t you?“

"There’s no s-sound!” she insisted, but Sans was chuckling.  "…is that what you do at the door all day?“ she asked, frowning.  "I just thought you were, uh.  T-testing the structural integrity of the door.  And… talking to someone?”

“Nah,” said Sans.  "Who would I be talking to?“

"On the other side of the d-door?” she suggested.

both of these people, liars.  I’m not sure Sans will be wholly surprised to find out Alphys didn’t make Mettaton, but the robot body’s still pretty damn impressive.  And in the true pacifist ending Alphys didn’t seem real surprised there was someone behind that door.

He shrugged.  "Anyway.  Just some suggestions.  But if you wanna give up… hey, I can’t blame ya.  Papyrus will recover from his disappointment.  Undyne probably knew it was a crazy idea in the first place.“  He reached around her to grab another donut.  "Anyway, I gotta go on my lunch break before she finds out I’m slacking off here.  Text her back, though, she seemed pretty worried.  And try to do it before she and my bro burn the house down with her stress-spaghetti-ing?”

And obviously when all else fails, Sans’ go-to solutions are 1. taking a break, and 2. giving up.  Not always in that order.

“Thanks,” said Alphys, half-heartedly.  She turned to ask another question, but found she was sitting in an empty room.  "…I think.  …well, hey, at least I have donuts.“

Having donuts means she’s definitely better off than where she was at the beginning of the fic!  Also I appreciate Sans having the ability to just vanish, because for whatever reason describing people walking to the door and saying “goodbye” is really boring to me and always trips me up.