#now we just need a question about Alphys an all the major story stuff will be answered XD

[selfshippinglover]

What was the incident and how did Cici and Papyrus find out about what Undyne had done to Sans?

Luckily for you, those two things are tied events basically :DD

INCIDENT

After finding out about what happened between Undyne and Sans, Ci became enraged. She practically ran all the way to Undyne’s castle purely on her fury! Once in, she DEMANDED an explanation, an apology, to return what was taken from her brother! This had been met with an act of VIOLENCE.

Despite the fact that Ci is not a fighter to begin with, as soon as soon as her eye flared the color green, Undyne went on the offensive and landed a direct hit to the rib cage- more specifically, on her SOUL.

This is when it’s revealed that Ci, in fact didn’t have a monster soul like Undyne had thought. Fearing for her life, Ci turned back and ran until she couldn’t keep running anymore. The anger that had burned bright now replaced with an overwhelming sense of FEAR. Hiding out in the CORE, she realized something was wrong with her SOUL, something that couldn’t be fixed by anyone here....

Since then, she’s lived in a clashing state of emotions when Undyne is brought up or seen.(Which is something she tries to avoid but is inevitable anyways considering she’s queen) She is not one to hate others easily but Undyne is one of the two people she does.

Side affects of the INCIDENT on the SOUL

~Something is wrong with her healing ability. See, before she could heal easily  and plentifully but now, big bursts of healing energy actually do damage to her HP

~Naturally she can take sometime to rest and it’ll heal up no problem but it really HURTS to do what once used to be easy and is her main ability

~The ribs around the soul are especially sensitive to attacks since their in constant contact with her soul

~So getting a hit there REALLY sucks(And naturally that gets targeted most often)

~Has trouble with breathing if her soul is acting up and/or if her ribs are hit

Finding out about Undyne

~Ci was there when Sans first came back from the castle so she could only assume that Alphys or Undyne had something to do with it. Seeing how bad the injuries are though, Undyne would make the most sense. so regardless of confirmation that was what she assumed caused the attack.

~This does get confirmed on a later note when Sans breaks down in anger about it later when they’re out on a walk together

~After helping to comfort Sans, the INCIDENT would occur

~Once she sneaks her way home through chest pain, she tells Papyrus everything on the couch as he looks on worriedly.

~She asks Paps not to discuss it with Sans(Presumably he didn’t want his bro to know since he wouldn’t tell him after all)

~She passes out a little while after the explanation. She doesn’t wake up for two days.

~While she’s asleep, Sans slips her some MEAT in little chunks but more specifically, the kind that still has BLOOD

Sans sees this as a chance to finally get his sister to eat as well as whatever thought process lead him to feeding Paps meat before taking control here

~Why exactly is a mystery to everyone but Papyrus sees him doing it secretly and tells her when they are alone

~As Sans had hoped, it did help the healing process but also gave her a taste for BLOOD

~She wakes up safe and sound and is greeted with a relieved Papyrus! (Sans is outside to cover for Paps watching over me for two days)

[thelibrarbian]

Rating: T

Chapter word count: 2384

Read on Ao3

or below:

---

Movement on the upper floor made Papyrus look up, just in time to see the door to Sans' room open and his brother step out. Sans shuffled up to the banister and leaned against it, looking down into the living room. When his gaze landed on the two skeletons on the couch, his eyebrows shot up, but all he said on the matter was a small "huh".

"did he wake up? thought i heard you guys talking."

"He did - well, somewhat." Papyrus glanced down at Fell, who appeared to be deeply asleep once again. It was less alarming now he knew that Fell wasn't Falling Down, but it was a strange sight nevertheless. He didn't even twitch in response to the talking right next to him, and Papyrus got the distinct impression that he wouldn't stir even if somebody broke down the door and started supplexing the couch. He made sure to keep his voice low anyway. "But I think he will be alright." Eventually. "For now, I suppose he has earned his rest."

Sans gave a vague hum of agreement, leaning heavily against the railing.

Papyrus looked his brother up and down, frowning slightly. "Sans… I know this is a rare thing for me to encourage, but I think you, too, should try to sleep a little. It's still the middle of the night, and while I may not need to nap for such an excessive amount of time, I do believe you're used to your eight hours of snoozing."

Sans chuckled and shook his head before pushing himself back from the banister.  "eh, it's fine." He began to shuffle down the stairs. "you keep telling me i should find hobbies other than napping, right?"

Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "That may be true, and far be it from me to curb your enthusiasm! But maybe we should postpone these plans to a time when you don't look like you're going to pass out standing up?" His quota for passed out skeletons this night was already filled.

"you mean i look bone tired?" Sans winked.

Papyrus let out a huff. "Do not attempt to distract me with your perpetual punning! That one was low even by your standards." He sighed. "But I suppose I can't be too hard on you today. How is Red?"

"still sleeping." Sans reached the bottom of the stairs and leaned against the banister. "and snoring like a chainsaw, that's why my napping's on hold."

Instead of pointing out that Sans usually had no trouble falling asleep even in the noisiest environments, Papyrus waved his brother over. He couldn't exactly give him a hug with Fell on his lap, so he settled for the closest alternative, placing a hand on his shoulder and giving it a gentle squeeze.

Sans raised an eyebrow. "you okay, bro? i mean, i'm not complaining about unprompted cuddles, but…"

Papyrus straightened himself. "Of course! I, the Great Papyrus, master of first aid and healing magic, am perfectly fine!"

Sans didn't look entirely convinced, which was absurd - after all, what reason did Papyrus have to not be okay? Everything was fine. Or would be fine very soon. No, Papyrus was more concerned about his brother - and he would have asked if he really was alright, but he already knew the question would just be shrugged off with another pun.

Setting that aside, though, there were currently two unconscious skeletons in their house, and even though everything was certainly going to be just fine, their unexpected guests would need something to help them recover both health and magic when they woke up. He shared the thought with his brother. "And as much as I would love to volunteer my culinary expertise, I am a little stuck here at the moment," he added. "So if you don't mind lending a hand again…"

"i gotcha, bro." Sans pat Papyrus' hand that was still on his shoulder. "and by that i mean, i'd get grillby's, but-"

Papyrus sighed. "But it's two in the morning," he finished the sentence for him. Grillby, too, belonged to the majority of monsters that slept at night, and therefore couldn't keep his establishment open around the clock. "Fortunately, because I can not in good conscience subject our guests to anything that comes out of that greasehole."

Sans chuckled faintly. "hey, you did like the milkshakes last time."

"The milkshakes are an exception! And do not distract from the issue at hand, brother! No Grillby's! You will need to make do with what we have. Such as…" Papyrus paused, mentally going through the contents of the fridge. Which was a rather small selection, now that he thought about it. Had he known that they would have visitors tonight, he would have moved his weekly shopping trip forward by a day. "Well, aside from your empty chips bag - which I am only tolerating because it's in your half of the fridge - there should be some spaghetti left over from yesterday…"

"oh. uh…" Sans looked aside, rubbing the back of his neck.

Papyrus was still waiting for the day when his brother would speak his honest opinion on his pasta, but today was not the time to have that conversation. He decided to rescue him. "I see what you are thinking, brother! Reheated pasta is not an appropriate meal for our recovering guests. It will be much better fresh, so we shall hold off on the spaghetti until I return with the groceries tomorrow."

Sans' shoulders visibly sagged in relief. "sounds great, bro."

"In the meantime, I believe we still have tomato soup in the freezer."

"nice." Sans gave an appreciative nod, the corners of his permanent grin rising up a little higher. "leave the tomato stuff to me, i got it."

"Thank you, brother." Papyrus gave Sans' shoulder another squeeze before letting him go.

It took a good minute before a realization struck him. "Sans!!" he whisper-yelled after him. "You are not going to put ketchup into that soup!"

All he heard in response was his brother bustling about in the kitchen.

---

It was hard to miss the exact moment when Red woke up. There was a thump and a muffled curse from the upper floor, then the sound of displaced air from a shortcut right next to the couch as Red appeared there, kicking a tangled blanket off his feet. The tension was practically oozing off of him, his eye lights darting once around the room before settling on his brother.

"is he…"

"He is going to be perfectly alright, yes." Papyrus made sure to inject as much sincerity as he could into the statement while still keeping his voice quiet. "He even woke up a little while ago, and I'm sure he will be on the mend in no time at all."

Red only gave a nod, his eye lights still fixed on his brother. Papyrus couldn't blame him.

"How are you feeling, Red? We were worried when you suddenly passed out - as comfortable as our carpet is, I do not think it was intended-"

"'m fine," Red interrupted him. The hollow tone to his voice, the dim eye lights, and the tense set of his shoulders told a different story, but Papyrus didn't press.

"My brother is making soup for all of us," he said instead. "Unless he has fallen asleep in the kitchen, that is. Which, while hardly surprising, would be rather ill-timed, not to mention a fire hazard…" He craned his neck to try and peer into the kitchen, hoping that Sans wasn't really asleep at the stove…

"nah, i'm soup-er awake over here," a familiar voice from the kitchen reassured him.

Red didn't even react to the pun. Instead, his eyes suddenly locked on the skeleton in Papyrus' lap with increased intensity, and Papyrus followed his gaze down.

Fell's sockets were open again. Maybe it was just Papyrus' imagination, but his eye lights looked a little brighter than before, even if he still didn't seem entirely aware. He wasn't trying to move, but the impression Papyrus got was more of a grouchy monster whose sleep had been disturbed rather than anything he really needed to worry about.

Red cracked a grin that was still looking strained. "heh. lookin' pretty cozy there, boss."

The only response was an unintelligible grumble and what seemed to be a weak attempt at a glare, although Papyrus couldn't tell for sure from his position. However, he didn't miss the way Red's shoulders sagged and his expression turned into something less of a tense grimace.

"Would you like to join us, Red?" Papyrus asked.

Red shook his head. "nah, 'm good. don't think ya two cuddle bugs have left enough space for my bony ass, anyway."

The pillow rustled as Fell lifted his head just slightly to look at his brother, and whatever Red saw on his face, it apparently made him change his mind. With a cautiousness Papyrus had never seen him use before, he shuffled over and perched on the very edge of the couch next to Fell's feet, settling a hand on an uninjured part of his leg. "there. happy?" he asked, the gruff tone to his voice not quite matching the care with which he was moving.

Fell gave a vaguely affirmative grunt and snuggled back into the pillows on Papyrus' lap, letting out a soft huff as his body relaxed again.

Red was watching his brother with a rare soft expression on his face that Papyrus had the strong feeling he wasn't supposed to see. He quickly looked away, occupying himself with rearranging the blankets.

There was a brief moment of silence before Red spoke up again. "y'know, i'd say sorry for dumping this on yer doorstep, but…"

Papyrus quickly shook his head. "Oh no, we're very happy to have you as our guests! I mean, I do wish we had you as our guests under different circumstances, but given the situation, I am very, very glad you came here!"

Red shrugged, leaning back against the arm of the couch. His hand remained on his brother's leg. "wasn't like we had much choice." His expression darkened slightly. "'t was either you guys or the doc, and who knows what she woulda…" He trailed off.

Before Papyrus could ask what the issue with their world's version of Alphys was, there was a familiar rush of displaced air as Sans appeared next to the couch, balancing a tray of soup bowls in his hands. "mornin', sleepybones," he greeted the latest arrival on the couch.

Red grumbled good-naturedly, grabbing a bowl before slumping back into his end of the couch, somehow without jostling Fell's legs in the slightest.

Sans unceremoniously plopped down on the ground with his own bowl after handing the third one to Papyrus. "bone appetit."

That particular pun was about as tired as Sans looked, but Papyrus still awarded the attempt with an eyeroll. He carefully took a sip - and yes, there was the unmistakable sweet tang of his brother's favorite condiment. "Sans…"

"'sup, bro?" He let his skull roll back against the couch, innocently grinning up at Papyrus.

"You know exactly what is 'up', brother." It didn't even taste bad, if Papyrus was completely honest, but it was a matter of principle.

"what, not a fan of the soup-prise ingredient? i think it tastes soup-erb."

Papyrus took the bait. "That's three times that you've used 'soup' in the span of five minutes!"

Sans shrugged. "what can i say, it's a classic. though i soup-pose i should ketchup on some new material…"

Papyrus let out a long-suffering sigh and turned to the other Sans in the room. "What about you, Red? Are you enjoying the soup? We can get you something" – he side-eyed his brother – "less ketchup-heavy…"

Red shook his head and gave a thumbs-up at the same time, emptying what appeared to be half the bowl in a single gulp. "nah, soup's perfect. gotta condiment yer cooking, comic."

"Don't encourage him!"

A snicker came from the ground next to the couch. "thanks. gotta admit, i've been stewing over it for a while, so i'm glad at least someone's relishing it."

Papyrus groaned. Quietly, of course, even though Fell seemed dead to the world again… no, that was a bad one.

Red's face suddenly split into a sharp-toothed grin that filled Papyrus with dread. "but ya know, i wonder if we could spice it up-"  

"Please do not wonder!" Papyrus tried to cut him off, but it was already too late.

"say no more." With an equally wide grin, Sans got up and disappeared into another shortcut. He returned a second later with a suspiciously yellow condiment bottle and tossed it at his alternate on the couch, who expertly caught it.

"Do not think I don't see how you're fully exploiting the fact that I can't get up right now!" Papyrus whisper-yelled.

Red made full eye contact as he uncapped the bottle and, teasingly slowly, turned it upside down above his bowl. Somehow, his grin widened even further.

Groaning, Papyrus threw an arm over his eye sockets (albeit slightly less dramatically than he would have done without a sleeping skeleton on his lap) so he didn't have to watch him squirt an ungodly amount of mustard into his soup. "Why??" he lamented. "Why must I be plagued by the only two monsters in existence who will ruin a perfectly good tomato soup with condiments?"

He sensed more than saw the bottle flying past him and back to Sans. There was another squelch of mustard being squeezed into soup.

"I swear, you're only doing this to torment me!"

"hey, don't knock it 'til you've tried it, bro."

"I don't need to try it to know that mustard has no place in a tomato soup!"

"nah," Red chimed in. "i think ya just haven't mustard up the courage fer it."

Papyrus buried his face in his hands.

"what's the matter, creampuff? can't take what we're dishin' out?"

Papyrus let out a perfectly silent screech to keep himself from smiling at the horrendous puns. Not to smile at the two Sanses' laughter that rewarded him proved more difficult, though. Playing along with their jokes was comfortable, familiar - and just for a little while, it was easier to pretend that everything truly was alright.

[the-river-person]

Any interesting world-building tidbit that wasn't included in your tales? This is a very interesting world you've got

I have three major bits that I desperately wanted to include in the story but never could find the right moment for. 1. (This hilarious dialogue snippet from Gaster and Alphys that never made it into the story but I decided was too funny to not save.) Alphys: (laying on floor) I’m nothing. Not a scientist. Useless. I’m just garbage. Gaster: (glances down at her briefly, looking thoughtful).... you’re recyclable. Alphys: !?!?!?!?!?? 2. I wanted to better explore the area below Waterfall, the deep pits that all the falls plunge down into, where once Alphys stood and considered throwing herself down into. The concept of it was a sort of transformation for Alphys and Undyne. They return to this place that might have been a place of tragedy, and they make it the start of something amazing. The cliffs below were riddled with caves and openings, an entire city carved straight into the rock, with grand staircases that lead down, and elevators that see a lot of use for those who don't want to walk (or can't). Can you imagine the place? Beautiful caves where every window opens up to the underside of the cascading, thundering waterfalls. And because they had hundreds of years to develop it all, the Lower City had gardens and fascinating landmarks to visit, a gallery devoted entirely to the art of Alphys' favorite animes (and oh boy were there some truly gorgeous works there. For some reason there was also a portrait of Mettaton as God and Alphys as Adam in a lovely oil painting that is a sort of imitative transformation piece of Michelangelo's very famous "The Creation of Adam". Nobody really knows who painted it, nor why, but the gallery director informed the public that it was donated anonymously as a gift to commemorate the gallery's Grand Opening.) Because Undyne had a huge part in the City's inception, there ended up being several small schools for various physical activities such as: Wrestling, Ballet, Clogging, Modern Dance, Taekwondo, Spear fighting, Sword fighting, and Water Aerobics. Also one very tiny school for Piano that consisted of Undyne herself and whoever she was teaching to play at their lessons three times a week. Down below are the Depths, the deepest and darkest part of the Underground's caverns. A massive lake that the falls plunge into. Most of its life has been spent without light of any kind, and even now it's still very shadowy. The Lower City of the cliffs sort of spills out between waterfalls to drift around the shore of the lake. But even 300 hundred years later it hasn't all been explored and the Lower City hasn't expanded much more (even with the Underground populous trying their best to spread out, they can't possibly fill every space. I'm working with an upper limit of 1,400-2,000 monsters total in the Underground, with a lower limit of 322 for the souls visible coming from Asriel in the game when he breaks the barrier. Due to the fact that Ghost Monsters were excluded from the soul snatching event, and the fact that there is literally no way to estimate how many spiders are in the Underground, both have been excluded from this counting.) At the far end of the dark lake a lonely outpost sits, home to a very very few monsters who either prefer the total solitude and darkness, or have come there for reasons of science. To study the pools of super-heated water and geysers, or the aquatic life somehow managing to thrive in the pitch black lake that is swimming with garbage from humans and monsters alike, or even geological strata that possesses very interesting formations this far down. There are numerous guidelines in place that prevent Monsters from staying at the Outpost for more than two months at a time for Mental Health concerns. Both Royal Scientists tried (separately) to use their position to override this rule. Undyne was sent to retrieve Alphys and bodily carried her back despite protests, and Queen Toriel herself came to order Gaster back to the Upper Underground (there were fireballs thrown before he finally gave up). 3. And finally, I actually fully intended to have a scene in the story where Sans demanded that Gaster tell him exactly how long they spent trapped down there, after all, he's the only one who kept track of it if you recall. But I completely spaced it when it came to writing those last few scenes. So I'll tell you my final calculations here. We know that Determination had a strange effect on the magic of the Barrier. Whenever a Reset happened, time in the Underground would move a tiny bit slower than time outside. The time spent inside the Barrier, counting both the truly ridiculous amount of time wasted in resets by both the Human and by Flowey, as well as the 300 years afterward that this story covers, comes somewhere around the area of 51,967,952,715 years. Or Fifty One Billion, Nine Hundred and Sixty Seven Million, Nine Hundred and Fifty Two Thousand, Seven Hundred and Fifteen. An insane amount of time. What’s my explanation for how the minds of various characters remained intact? Well, Gaster spent long long periods of time sleeping. He wasn’t fully himself yet as his assistants hadn’t managed to collect enough pieces of him. So unstable and having a warped perception of time kept him from actually going insane, instead letting him sleep for centuries at a time. Sans actually didn’t start to become fully aware until quite a long ways into the resets, and then spent a while trying to figure out what was going on, fought with everything he could for a while in endless genocide routes, and then eventually lost hope entirely and sort of... went on automatic for a long time before he woke up enough to change something (a single question was all it took). And Flowey stayed in a similar state for thousands of years, quietly repeating the exact same conversations, the same actions, the same patterns. The only times he was even aware enough to notice the passage of time was when something new happened. These are not in any way realistic ways of reacting to such a vast period of time. From what science we understand about the brain, it would barely last more than a couple hundred years at the very most, but probably less than that. And that’s if you can keep it in perfect condition without any decay. Memories would begin to go long before that, only fragments remaining and the brain keeping only what is relevant to you now. But lots and lots of old stories depict supernatural and magical beings as sleeping for centuries in forgotten temples, under castles, in sealed magical caverns, in caves on beds of treasure, and a thousand other variances. So I wanted to explore that in the way of a part of the Monster Soul that would act as a self defense mechanism to the Mind of the Monster who was somehow living and living and living without possibility of dying and needed to be able to stay sane throughout that. So it either makes them sleep, or in severe circumstances it can put them on a sort of automatic mode where they repeat a sequence ad infinitum. Both have their roots in folklore, but the way it works is my own interpretation of the idea. Outside the barrier, however, is a different story. The full total of time that has  passed out there is 10,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000,​000. Known as Duotrigintillion, or also as one Googol. While the Underground got slower and slower and slower, the rest of the Universe continued on at its usual pace. The planet earth was destroyed by the Sun going into its Red Giant Phase, and then it became a White Dwarf. Then a Black Dwarf. Galaxies and super-galaxies went slowly dark, matter was dissolved or eaten by black holes, even black holes eventually began to decay due to Hawking Radiation. And because the light, garbage, and air being let into the Underground were the exact same stuff that was being let in at the beginning and was just on repeat forever, the Monsters never noticed. It was only when a run went on a little longer than usual, when the Barrier started trying to correct itself by syncing up time again, when you could see the darkness beyond. A darkness without stars and without life. Only cold and shadow, forever. The absolute and inexorable Heat Death of the Universe. Is it the only Universe in the Multiverse that has lived its full possible lifetime from beginning to end? Possibly. Ink would know. Whatever the case, its certainly a very very old Universe indeed (It probably is one of several branches off the original Universe, a stray timeline become a Universe in its own right).

[friskheart000]

I’ll Try to Be Good: Solving the Alpha Enigma

Hello Internet! Welcome to Webcomic Theory (Is that too much of a ripoff? Probably), where we sift through the dark depths of Tumblr to over-analyze fan-made and original content alike. Today’s topic? Ask Frisk and Flowey, also known as I’ll Try to be Good (@illtrytobegood) by Lovely Lady Artist. It’s a fancomic that takes place after the True Pacifist ending of a video game called Undertale, and though it started off as a simple fluff ask blog, it’s now been revealed that there’s something more to this story than its apperant plot of Flowey adjusting to life on the Surface. If you haven’t read AFAF yet I highly recommend doing so, both because we’ll be covering some MAJOR spoilery topics, and just because it’s a great series. With that out of the way, grab your echo flowers and open up the ask box, because today we aim to get to the bottom of I’ll Try to Be Good.

The focus of today’s theory is figuring out what we can about the Alpha Timeline, specifically what we see in LLA’s alternate blog, @unknown-20xx. For those of you who aren’t familiar with this strange side comic, Unknown 20xx follows a group of askers left in the remnants of the Alpha Timeline, from which AFAF’s Sans and Flowey originate from. They were separated from it and brought into the AFAF timeline, which we’ll call the Beta timeline, after Flowey blew up the Core and performed a Reset. Due to the magic of an asker, they are currently (at the time of me writing this) back in the Alpha timeline again, in a time before everything went downhill, as we see in Unknown 20xx. That blog shows the timeline in a state of ruin, with only 13 of over a thousand monsters still alive. Time seems to be frozen for everything but the survivors, and magic cannot be regenerated. The entire latter half of the Underground is more or less destroyed. 

So what happened? What point in time are we seeing through this side blog? My theory is that it occurs after Sans and Flowey make it back to the Beta timeline, whenever their time in Alpha ends. This would make sense with Papyrus saying that everything started going downhill right after the two left, and we know it couldn’t be after they first wind up in the Beta timeline because in that same conversation, Papyrus shows familiarity with the askers, beings he was clearly unaware of when this event began, and mentions that Flowey talked with them, with us, frequently. Flowey only started communicating with the askers a few weeks after he came to the Surface, when Frisk invited us. There would be no way for him to communicate with us beforehand, securing this place in the timeline to be after Sans and Flowey leave and things start going bad. 

“But FriskHeart!” I hear you say. “Unknown said that they had just gotten back from terrorizing Flowey in his nightmares while they were walking through an empty Snowdin! And Papyrus’ letter got delivered to Sans before they even arrived there!” The answer is simpler than you give it credit for. It’s just time travel. The Unknown went into the past, which was the present for us askers, to torment Flowey, and we sent a letter into the past, which, again, was our present. We’re seeing two different timelines at two different periods of time. This fact is going to be extremely helpful for figuring out what’s going to happen in AFAF, but first we need to understand things here, so let’s move on.

Okay, so we know this blog’s basic place in the timeline. It occurs after this event ends and our heroes (?) return to Beta. This would explain in part why Unknown said that what we were seeing was the consequences of our actions. We had nothing to do with the Alpha Timeline until now, when we pulled this stunt to bring Sans and Flowey back. Let’s move on to the next major enigma: the messages in the Echo Flowers.

While walking through Waterfall with Unknown we hear a string of messages in the Echo Flowers as we go. The earlier messages say things like “Chara, where are you? Chara?” and “I know. You’d never hurt me Chara... I trust you.” As the askers walked farther, the messages grew more unsettling. “Where are we going?” “Chara, I’m scared... I don’t know if it’s a good idea to-” The voices end with “Chara, what are you doing...?” “Chara, s-stop!” “Chara, p-please, don’t you re-” “It’s me, As-” before being cut off with a scream. There’s only one message left, from a different speaker, who seems to be crying. “Asriel, why won’t you try to defend yourself from me?”

Okay, that’s a lot to take in. The first speaker is clearly Asriel, who’s being led off by the final speaker, Chara, who seems to kill him for some reason? Oooookay then. That’s...odd. So what exactly is going on here? Well, there’s not much we can go off of right now, but we do have some clues that could point us in the right direction. First, it’s important to mention that this is NOT a recounting of when Chara and Asriel first died. Flowey has confirmed that in the Alpha Timeline things basically went he same way as before up to a point, meaning that the buttercup incident still happened, and Asriel died in the throne room, not in Waterfall. Also, the chances of the Echo Flowers retaining those voices for so long seems pretty unlikely. But if it’s not that first time when they died, when is it? The only place in the timeline that would make sense would be some time while Sans and Flowey are in Alpha, but that couldn’t be possible...right? And yet, there’s nowhere else for it to fit. If it had taken place before, then Flowey wouldn’t have been waiting for Chara to wake up, because they already would have, and it couldn’t take place after because he wouldn’t be there. He’d be back in Beta. So...it would seem like it has to take place some time before Sans and Flowey return to the Beta timeline.

So what does that mean for the story? A LOT. If this is true, that means that Chara would have to return in some form (most likely in a ghost form or something similar, as we see that their grave is undisturbed) and be made to try and kill their brother, even though they don’t seem to want to. This would also mean that Flowey would likely...become Asriel again?! There’s no way! Right? And yet, that would be the only thing to make sense. The Echo Flowers clearly repeat Asriel’s voice, not Flowey’s, and while Flowey can change his voice and has before, he doesn’t seem to find the need to to so in front of Chara. In the M!A event “Another Omegaful Life”, one of the askers brings back Chara and Flowey retains his typical yellow text for the most part. He’s actually used his Asriel voice with SANS more than he has Chara. How exactly he would turn back is hard to say, as he’s only been able to do so one time during the M!A “A Soul For Flowey”, when an asker gave him their soul. This is not a great source for what it would take to help him become Asriel again as we have no idea how powerful an asker soul is compared to a monster or human soul, and the event was mainly powered by the strength of M!A anyway. However, if the Echo Flowers are at all reliable, him turning back via sciencey stuff, M!A, or something else seems to be the most logical option. And all of this may very well occur when he and Sans are in the Alpha Timeline, as they are right now.

It’s also important to try and answer the question of whether or not Asriel actually died. The final page with his voice in the Echo Flowers is tagged as “death mention”, yet Chara says “Why DON’T you try to defend yourself from me?” The use of the word don’t instead of didn’t, as well as the the fact that Sans and Flowey will make it back to Beta alive (hopefully), suggests that Chara didn’t kill Asriel. “But what about Unknown saying that Asriel was ‘sleeping’?” I hear you protest. Yes, that could mean that he died, but it could also have to do with Flowey currently sleeping at the time, over in the Beta timeline, and be purposefully meant to mislead us. It does have a darker implication to it, but that isn’t necessarily enough to be considered proof.

After Sans and Flowey return to Beta, things get pretty self-explanatory. The Core, along with Hotland and New Home, get destroyed and all but about 13 monsters die. Thanks to the time-space shenanigans going on, the entire world save for the survivors remains frozen in time. Plants don’t grow and lost magic can’t be regenerated. Since the Echo Flowers are now frozen in time, they repeat the same messages over and over throughout the Underground. Papyrus becomes a scavenger for the survivors, Alphys tries to use her science knowledge to help in any way that she can, and Toriel nears falling down. The askers manage to heal her before taken out by two figures, who seem to be...Sans and Flowey? Okay, what’s going on there?

First off, we can confirm that these two are NOT the Sans and Flowey we’ve come to know and tolerate. This Sans has an eye injury and a different outfit, and the Flowey has red eyes. The Flowey we know (who I’ll refer to as Alpha Flowey) has never had those bright red eyes, especially when paired with the smiling expression. This alternate Flowey bears a much closer resemblance to the smiling red-eyed flower Alpha Flowey saw when he was having a panic attack while having tea with Toriel and Papyrus. The have the same smile and red eyes. Beyond that, the two are tagged at the bottom of the post as Beta Sans and Beta Flowey.

It’s hard to say exactly who these two are, but my best guess is that they’re the Sans and Flowey from the Beta timeline, the ones replaced by Alpha Sans and Flowey. The Alpha pair seems to believe that the Beta pair just ceased to exist and they took their place, but they’ve been wrong before. And with the name similarities, it would definitely fit.

Now we only have one major question remaining, one I’m not sure of myself. Who is Unknown? Are they the personification of “the anomaly”? Or are they something else entirely? I’m eager to hear any fellow theorists’ thoughts on the subject as we figure out what to do next. 

In the meantime, remember, that’s just a theory! A Webcomic Theory! And I really need to change this thing’s name!