The Lab Underfell Version

“Investigate the Lab; see if you can find anything of use to us.”


The head of the Royal Guard, Papyrus and his daughter, Ash ventured into the dept. of Hotland, on their way to investigate the Lab as ordered by the king. It wasn’t as if the Lab was a mystery to anyone and Alphys had worked their most of her life and she couldn’t find anything of interest, besides her cameras and her personal uses of the Lab's computers so it was odd that Asgore had ordered them to do such a thing.


Nonetheless, Papyrus had a mission to fulfill and he wasn’t going to disappoint him. Ash was also determined to help her father with the investigation. She had never been to the Lab before and had little-to-no knowledge of the Lab, aside from the bits of information that Inu and Yuna had told her but now she was going to see it for herself.


“Remember, my daughter,” Papyrus said, breaking the silence of the walk. “While the main parts of the Lab are stable because of Alphys but the king has ordered us to investigate the further parts that even she has not seen before, we must be careful, however I don’t think you need that warning.”


The little hybrid monster nodded to her father. “Of course, Father, I know to be careful. I assure you I will not get in harm’s way.” She gave the skeleton a determined look.


This made him smile. Ash was very much like her father, strong and courageous and she always wanted to make monsters proud no matter what the task was. The pair soon arrived at the entrance of the Lab door.


Papyrus looked to Ash. “Alright, Ash we are about to enter.” He said before he dug into the pockets of his jeans and pulled out the keys that Alphys had given them and placed them inside the keyhole and after hearing the click, the doors slowly opened.


The opened doors offered the father and daughter darkness but it was expected. Ever since the freeing of the monsters, Alphys didn’t use the Lab anymore so a lot of dust and darkness wasn't a big surprise. Ash dug into one of the side pockets of a small backpack she wore and took out a flashlight. “Always come prepared, just like you always say, Father.” She said handing him the flashlight.


He nodded before he stepped forward, turning on the flashlight and looked around for a light switch. He finds one after walking a few more steps into the corridors as he flips the switch.


The lights flickered a few times before turning on, the light was dim and flickering, probably from a dying light source but it was enough for them to see. “Alright, Ash, let’s go.” He said turning off the flashlight and handing it back to her.


The two walked and walked but nothing out of the ordinary came up since it was still the entrance until they reached the main entrance of the Lab. Pushing a button Papyrus believed was the entrance button opened with a small hiss and almost as if it was timed, the light from the entrance died, leaving the two in total darkness.


The little girl turned on the flashlight, hoping it would offer them the light they needed but to her shock, nothing happened. It was like a cruel joke at this moment; first the corridor light and now their flashlight, but it wasn't as if Papyrus was upset for he knew that he had a secret emergency light source right beside him.


“Well, Ash, looks like I’m going to rely on your night vision.” He said his voice almost seemed to echo in the dark lab. “Tell me what you see.” Inheriting a lot of abilities from her mother, this was nothing to Ash. Silhouettes of lab equipment was seen to Papyrus but to Ash the equipment was plain as day. She could see monitors, computers and some old lockers and cabinets probably containing files that were probably of experiments or theories.  She let out a silent groan of disappointment before turning to her father and shaking her head. "Nothing unexpected, Father, basic equipment and cabinets and that's it."


Papyrus groaned loudly, crossing his arms across his boney chest and letting out a very long and annoyed statement of disappointment. Ash rolled her eyes and let out a silent chuckle at her father’s rant. It was soon then that her senses picked up something that shouldn’t be there…it was unsettling. “Father…” she said softly, stopping the skeleton’s rant. Papyrus raised a brow, curious at his daughter’s now worried expression.


“What’s wrong, Ash?” he asked. She turned her head toward a lone door, faded with age in the back of the room that had warning tapes across the front. It clearly meant stay away but there was something in that room was calling, like an angry spirit demanding to be freed. Papyrus could sense that she was getting scared about something which was odd…


Ash never got scared. She was as brave as a lion and then some and always protected Blair from anyone who dared to bully or harass her. Most of the monster children feared her, not because she was Papyrus’s daughter but because she was not someone you wanted to make angry. And now, seeing his usually brave child looking worried and scared was very concerning. “Ash, what do you see?” he asked.


“It’s not what I see; it’s what I sense…” she replied with a lump in her throat. “There is something inside that door that wants to get out and…” she gulped.


“Enough.” He said gently, placing his hand on her forehead and brushing back her dark red bangs before picking her up in his strong arms and rested her on his forearm. “If you want to wait outside for me it’s alright, I’ll go inside the door by myself.”


“No, Father it’s alright, I’m okay…” she said hesitantly. She didn’t want to back down now. The uneasy feeling of fear she was feeling was probably the darkness playing tricks on her. “Besides a guard never leaves another guard behind.” 


Papyrus nodded before he walked toward the door and reached the old doorknob and turned it. The rusty hinges let out a soft creak as it opened up slowly. Ash flinched as the door opened, her eyes went to size of tennis balls.


Before them was an abandoned area of the lab, probably used for some kind of horrible experiments. She could also see some bodily images inside what it appeared to be containers, she could see limp, soulless gray creatures inside them; Wires were attached to the heads and bodies and upon leaning in closer to get a better look, she could see that the creatures had bled badly at one point for the lower parts of their body were stained and crusted with blood. She knew it was blood...even from inside the glass containers she could smell the metallic odor that blood gave off. This was only half of what she was feeling...


Papyrus, judging by his daughter’s expression that whatever the darkness was hiding from him was not a good sign. Using his free hand, a glowing red aura formed from his right eye and his palm, a small light was good enough for him to see what she was seeing and it was enough to make the skeleton’s jaw drop.


“What the Hell?” he asked softly. “What is this?” he dared to take a step. A soft cracking sound was heard from his step, looking down he sees a small vial that was spilling a sort of purplish liquid into a small pool on the dusty floor. He breathed a sigh of relief that it wasn’t something much worse. He quickly shook away that thought, worried that Ash would pick up on that.


Papyrus then gently put his daughter back on the ground next to him, but gently put his hand on the back of her head and pulled her close to his boot covered leg. "Stay close, daughter, I don't like this..." he said in a whispered voice. She nodded slowly and gently gripped onto his boot for comfort and protection.


The pair ventured slowly and further into the bizarre room, the glow of Papyrus’s red light could make out black cabinets and lockers of sorts. He opened one and inside was many files, alphabetized into the correct sections. He pulled out a few of them that stood out among the rest; these files were somewhat bigger than the others and the parchment paper was black and what really made them stand out was in front of each file in faded dark purple ink were bold words in a font form that looked familiar…


Suddenly, there was a noise that the two could make out as something as a crash, though in the darkness and stillness of the room it might as well have been a volcano eruption. Ash let out a small whimper while Papyrus’s brows furred into an angry mask on his boney face and the glow from his palm and eye grew brighter.


“Who’s there?!” he demanded. “Show yourself, coward!”


Nothing answered him. It was as quiet as it was from the moment they came into the room, but it somehow got quieter. Looking to Ash, he kneeled down to her level and handed her the files. “Stay here and don’t move…I’m going to look around. If you see something that you think is a threat, scream and I’ll come back and then we will leave. This area is starting to disturb me…”


Ash sniffled but nodded slowly. ‘There’s my brave girl.’ He thought to himself as he leaned in and pressed his ‘lips’ to her forehead before standing up and headed into the dept of the darkness, leaving the eight-year old by herself.


She looked at the files and she could make out the font as “Wingdings”, a font that was made up of different symbols. She being an egghead was no stranger to the font, but to translate it was a different matter. ‘Maybe Blair can help me with this…’ she thought.


Curious, she dared to open the files to see if maybe there was something else inside them that she could read. Her finger barely touched the parchment when her vision went black.


“Darker…darker…yet darker…”


Those words echoed in her mind as the girl looked around her to see that she was stuck in an endless black void. She looked to either side of her directions, seeing if she could find her father but to no avail. She wanted to scream but she couldn’t. Suddenly, a white light stretches across the horizon of the void and a scene appeared;


A man, a skeleton like man dressed in a long black trench coat was standing beside a large screen and next to him were two smaller skeleton figures in pajamas. The large screen was humming and a blue hue shadowed him.


“The experiment is almost complete, my sons…” he spoke to the younger skeletons, confirming that they were his sons. “Soon enough I will have control over the timelines and my theory will come true…” he had an inappropriate grin on his face. The boys tilted their head to the side as the older boy spoke. “Dad, what’s going to happen to the timelines that you go into?”


The man chuckled before turning to him, his pupils were glowing a faint purple. “You see, Sans, when I go into those timelines I will test my theory and that is if a monster is killed or hurt it will somehow affect the other timelines.”


‘SANS?!” her mind screamed. This man was her uncle Sans and father’s father?! This was a vision of the past that she was seeing and she probably shouldn’t see. Putting the pieces of the puzzle in her mind together carefully, she had an understanding of what this was...


Her grandfather, a man of science, probably the scientist before Alphys was working on a dangerous experiment on entering timelines. From what she has been told by her Uncle, entering timelines was extremely dangerous but to enter into a timeline to kill monsters? This was too much to process...a man wanting to kill just for the sake of a theory was enough to make her skin crawl and her stomach turn. She felt nauseous just from the thought of such a thing. A dark red hue shadowed her as she dared to move her head to where her grandfather was but the scene she saw before her made a soft gasp come from her lips and her eyes had grown two sizes; 


The skeleton man was standing before a fallen community of dead monsters and one of them a dead human that appeared to be similar to Frisk, the human woman she considered to be part of her family and the human she was very close too and to see her lying on the ground, stained with blood and being nothing more than a cadaver alongside other monsters she knew was something no child should see. Ash covered her mouth with shock as her eyes began to fill with tears. The man turned around and smiled widely, blood was seeping down his forehead all the way down to his body. He let out a sickening laugh.


She wanted to scream for help, she wanted to go home and curl up in the safety of her mother and father’s arms and just stay there. She wanted to run or fly away from this bloody vision. Screams of the innocent monsters were echoing in her ears as she gripped her head and began to shake violently, tears were streaming down her face as she fell to her knees. “No more…” she said softly. “No more…!”


The shaking girl looked up to see the monster in the black trench coat was in front of her, smiling down at her. Ash couldn’t move as he leaned into her ear. “Remember…Wing Ding Gaster…granddaughter…” his voice was dark and lilting as various dark shadows surrounded them followed by the dark whispers of the innocent deceased coming close to her. She shook with terror as more tears streamed down her cheeks. The whispers of the dead were repeating the same word; "Remember..."


“FATHER!” she cries out with all of her might, praying to God, Asgore, anyone that he finds and rescues her. An array of glowing red bones comes into sight as they strike the shadows making them vanish. Papyrus was rushing towards them; he had a furious expression on his face though faint tear stains could be seen from his eye sockets. The figure of Gaster grinned deviously. “My son…” he said slowly as he vanished into darkness.


Papyrus knelt down to his daughter and hurriedly picked up her in his arms and held her close to his chest before he stands and takes off as fast as he can. He didn’t dare to look back but Ash was looking back; she could see the image of her grandfather still there with a glowing black aura surrounding him as he began to fly after them.


“Hurry, Father!” she cried out, gripping her father’s shoulder tightly, Papyrus held her tightly before running even faster. The light from Hotland was a good distance away as he sprinted to the open door. Gaster's shadowy hand slowly reached for them, ready to encase the two into darkness just as he was. With a loud grunt of effort he bursts through the door with forced speed and slammed the door shut, using his magic to levitate the keys out of his pocket and locking the door. The two could almost hear the ghostly figure scream with despair...


Panting harshly, he slowly slides onto the ground against the door and looked at his daughter to see how she was. His eyes went wide with shock; Ash’s eyes were puffy and red; tears were streaming down her face and she was shaking out of control. Never before had he had seen his child like this and it was something he never wanted to see again. Papyrus cradled her gently against his chest as she hugged him tightly, burying her face into his vest and sobbing. “Shh…shh…” he told her gently, stroking her hair. “It’s okay, it’s okay, I got you, I'm here…shh…shh…” he slowly rose to his feet. “Let's go home…”


The way back home seemed to take longer for the two. The monsters they passed had looks of confusion and shock on their faces as they see Papyrus carrying his daughter so closely to him than he had ever had before. They could see the tear stains on his face and a few more tears dared to seep out of his eye sockets, no one dared to ask why. On the way home they encountered Undyne and her son who were in the middle of training practice.


Undyne’s spear fell to the ground with a soft clatter as her mouth and eye widened, Inu followed suit. The two rushed over to them. “Pap, what happened why are you crying? Are you hurt?” she inquired. Papyrus turned to his fish friend and partner in battle. He answered after a short while. “…Training practices are canceled for the next week, be sure to tell the King that as well and to tell him that we didn't find anything in the Lab of use...”


She nodded, not daring to ask the reason. Inu, meanwhile was staring in disbelief at Ash. His crush never got scared and she never cried,  to see her like this was extremely concerning to him, just as much as it was to her father. She looked at him and she could see that the boy was just as worried as his mother was. “I’ll tell you some other time…” she whispered before burying her face back into her father’s chest. Inu didn’t press any harder than that.


The pair then headed back home. Papyrus opened the door and slowly closed the door, gently placing Ash to the floor next to him. He sighed softly, resting his forehead against the door and closing his eyes, the energy was sucked clean out of his body from the experience but he was glad and relieved that he was back home. They were unharmed physically but emotionally they were deeply cut, like a butcher slicing through a fresh cut of meat and the blood slowly seeping out onto the knife. 


Shadow came into the room hearing the door open; the Vampiren had an apron around her waist and was wearing a smile. “Hey there, investigators,” she smiled. “Great timing, dinner’s on the table. I made your favorite-…” her smile faded as she sees her husband and daughter.


“Fell…Ash…what’s wrong…?” she asked walking up to her family. Ash looked up at her mother before running up to her and jumping into her arms, sobbing into her breast. “Mother!” she cried. “Oh, Mother!”


Shadow's eyes went wide with shock as Ash sobbed into her. She hugged her tightly on instinct. “Ash, what happened, sweetheart? Why are you crying?” she looked to her husband and she could see that he was trying to hold in his tears. “Fell what happened?”


He took a small breath to compose himself, he wouldn't dare hide this from his wife for she was someone he could trust with his life but to explain what had happened to them would not be easy How he could explain this to his brother was also on his mind, but he decided to not think about it until later. He slowly walked up to Shadow and put his arm around her and Ash and hugged them close to him. He rested his chin on Shadow's shoulder before answering in a low voice. "I'll tell you after dinner..."