#Sabian Specific UT lore

[sabianandocs]

I’m very interested to hear your Gaster interpretation as someone who likes to make my own!

Okayokay long ramble incoming- Kind of a mix of my Gaster lore and the Skelebros since they're kind of intertwined for my stuff --- I'll try to break up the paragraphs with doodles so it's not just a block of text

My version of Gaster is a mix between the usual crazy scientist interpretation and also someone who just really really wants to be a parent. (there is an appeal to the version of Gaster that's just.. Awful and creates the skelebros as experiments, but I wanted to go for a little of a more wholesome approach for my lore cuz I feel like they've been traumatized enough lol)

There aren't any other skeletons in the underground except for Gaster, though, and also I headcanon him as aro/ace so he was like. Yeah I'll figure something out on my own. SO! Inbetween working on the Core and trying to find ways to break the barrier, he did studies in his own time on SOUL magic to find out if it was possible to create life only using the SOUL magic of a single monster (rather than the usual two). His research on how to break the barrier overlapped some with this research so he get away with using the royal science lab/materials/etc for it.

Some science junk, blah blah, he found that it could be possible- if he took a chunk out of his own SOUL. And I suppose probably also the chunks out of his hands to provide the physical material necessary (Can thank Handplates for that idea). And that was a sacrifice he was willing to make for Science and also Child.

(The next section is copy-pasted directly from my lore google doc)

Gaster was cautious with his experiments for his first attempt. He didn’t want to risk a huge chunk of his soul on a first try that he thought would surely abort itself, so he only used a little bit, plus the extra soul power he was able to create through his own desire to have kids and probably some sketchy magic injection type stuff.

However, the first attempt didn’t abort. Despite his hesitancy and being sure that this first run would just be a proof of concept, or to just to figure out where things could possibly go wrong and how to fix them (he did all the calculations beforehand and everything, of course, but real life never plays out like the simulations), the soul actually took and began to create itself. He grew it and took care of it in an incubator in the lab, and during this time he slept at the lab a LOT, terrified that something would go wrong if/when he wasn’t there. As time went on and the soul & vessel it created became more stable, he got a little less freaky weird about being away from it for short periods of time.

  I guess probably this process takes about 9 months because??  That’s how long it takes to build a whole skeleton with magic soul power probably?  Idk man.  Anyway because they’re magic skeletons and there’s no reason to ‘birth’ (read: remove from the incubator) the soul & vessel before its able to support itself (unlike humans, who are all born premature because our heads would be too big otherwise) the new skeleton usually starts trying to become independent (get born) around the developmental size that humans would associate with a 1 or 2 year old.  

And thus Sans was created!  Gaster feels extremely guilty that Sans is so weak because technically it’s his fault for not committing more of his soul to him but he’s so so happy to finally have a kid and does everything in his power to keep Sans safe despite his weaknesses and help him learn how to navigate around them (Including sleeping to regain above max HP!)  

When Sans got old enough to kinda do his own thing around Gaster (like 5 or 6?) Gaster decided it was time to make another kid for a number of reasons: 

To redeem himself scientifically: He had proof he could make a living being, but with Sans he’d hesitated and Sans suffered because of it.  He wanted to make another who was more healthy

To give Sans a sibling: Both because Sans seemed kind of lonely and because he figured they would be able to keep each other safe that way- when they got older the sibling could help protect Sans and ‘make up’ for his disabilities by being able to help him out (Gasters view on it- I used airquotes deliberately. People with disabilities can function just fine on their own. Gaster sees Sans' disabilities of a failing of his (Gaster) own so he views it more negatively because he feels guilty about it.)

Because he wanted to: Gaster always wanted at least two kids and now that Sans was a little more stable and independent Gaster could handle the responsibilities & time dedication of having another little one around

And so Gaster did the whole thing again, but took a bigger chunk of his soul this time and probably more sketchy soul injection things to create more soul power.

And blah blah 9 months of waiting and sitting around in the lab being anxious and BAM!  Papyrus is born!

The boys grew up mostly in the lab and around it since Gaster was so involved in his work, but Toriel and Asgore babysat sometimes too (Papyrus’ memories of the ‘green’ but not remembering Toriel because he was too little).  Gaster was a super involved parent as well, and even hired Alphys as an assist in the lab so he didn’t have to spread himself so thin with work and his kids.  (Alphys only worked on vague assistance type stuff, which is why after Gaster got shattered across time she had no recollection of the deeper workings of the Core or of Gaster’s studies- anything that wasn’t erased with Gaster was really vague surface-level stuff)

As time went on, Sans got interested in the science that Gaster was doing.  Sans and Papyrus hung out at the lab a ton, especially as they got a little older and didn’t need quite as much direct adult supervision.  Mostly Sans just watched after Papyrus, but occasionally he’d watch Gaster work instead or in addition.  Gaster taught him as best he could at an age appropriate level, and so Sans ended up something of a scientific prodigy.  Papyrus didn’t take the same interest & spent most of his time pretending to be a knight and/or learning magic instead.  Gaster taught both of them how to fight & how to use magic in his own homeschooling sort of curriculum (Reason why no one knew them before they showed up in Snowdin- they stayed pretty much just around the lab & the castle)

Oh, also, the cracks in Gaster’s skull appeared after each kid!  Because splitting his soul weakened his magical ability it also weakened his physical form somewhat so he got more brittle.  Sans’ soul piece caused the split down his eye to his mouth, and Papyrus’ caused the one from his eye up his skull- bigger & worse because 1. He was already more fragile after having Sans and 2. Papyrus was a bigger piece of his soul

When Sans was 17 and Papyrus was 11, Sans had been actively helping around the lab and the Core for a few years.

Gaster and Sans were running around the core performing some routine maintenance or something but someone didn’t get the memo that they were in the sector that they were in and started rearranging the Core (as you do.  Literally it’s part of how the place works the hallways get rearranged)  Sans was a little behind Gaster because he’d been fixing up some wires or something and so when he went to catch up he saw what happened next but couldn’t do anything about it.

Gaster was stepping between sectors when the rooms shifted.  He had one foot on the next sector and one on the previous, so when they detached and swung out he got flung.  Directly into the Core.  And was shattered across time and space.

When Gaster got disintegrated across time he took people’s memories of Sans and Papyrus too-  Because they shared parts of his soul, they occupied the same parts of people’s memory as Gaster did, which was all overwritten after the Accident.

Sans and Papyrus also forgot most of their direct ties to Gaster- they remembered having a dad, being raised, the things they learned (magic, schooling, etc) but not anything about their dad, or what he did, or who he was.  Directly after the Core Accident, Sans woke up at their house in the Capital (where Gaster and the boys technically lived when they weren’t all at the lab), only remembering that his dad was gone- but not how, or why- and when he dug in his mind for what his dad looked like or who he was, he got a headache and gave up.  Papyrus was also home.  To the best of their collective recollection and filling in gaps with assumptions, their dad had died, maybe recently?  And now they were on their own.  They had no income anymore, or maybe at all ever?  And they couldn’t afford to stay where they were.  The capital is expensive, after all.  And…  And this house was for royal officials and their families anyway, they weren’t supposed to be there.  They made up the idea that they’d been allowed to live there to get back on their feet after their dad’s death (the king is generous, after all) since the place had been vacant anyway and the king/queen/someone official had felt bad for them.  

So they moved to Snowdin!

Aaaand the next chunk of the doc is on the Skelebros so I'll spare you of it since that's not what you asked. Tbh most of this is probably more than you asked but thank you for giving me the opportunity to ramble!!

[sabianandocs]

may i get more sans chronic pain headcanon lore pls

Absolutely!!!

Sans has chronic pain because his SOUL is weaker than normal and has to work harder to keep him up and about, due to the way he was created (Read here for context on that). Since monsters are made of magic, and their SOULs create that magic to keep them physical and healthy, a SOUL that creates less or weaker magic leads to a monster with less physical strength, or in severe cases like Sans, general chronic pain.

If/when he overexerts himself (which is easy for him to do, since his tolerance threshold for exercise and just general exertion is lower than most monsters) the pain gets worse, as the SOULs sort of self-regulation tactic to get him to stop doing that so it can recuperate. Essentially, when he does anything that's too strenuous, his SOUL downs him so that it can rebuild its magic stores again. He can push through that pain if he needs to, but if he does it'll be twice as bad afterwards, and he'll take twice as long to recover.

Ironically, teleporting takes less magical exertion for him than walking long distances does, which is why he likes to use his shortcuts to get most places. (Teleporting is easy for him because he's very practiced in it, and doesn't take a lot of magical energy unless he's going really far, versus walking, which takes the energy of moving all his limbs and joints and his equivalent of breathing and heart rate etc etc; essentially, walking is a lot more moving parts compared to just 'taking a shortcut')

He also gets migraines because he has really awful vision in his right eye; He can only see light and movement in that eye, which puts strain on his brain (does he have a brain?? Whatever the skeleton magical equivalent is) that leads to migraines. Could probably be mitigated if he wore an eyepatch or sunglasses or something but he's got an issue with trying to present like he's 'normal' because he doesn't want people to perceive his weaknesses and possibly take advantage of them (he has a general distrust for most people).

Similarly, he would probably benefit from a wheelchair or similar mobility aids, but since Papyrus just carries him around most of the time why bother. (plus, then, it's seen as more of a cute sibling dynamic rather than dealing with pitying glances from strangers)

Papyrus also has pain & vision issues, also because of the way he was created, but not as bad as Sans, and he deals with it differently. But that's a topic for a different post! (here's Papyrus Vision too though, since I made it anyway)

I hope you enjoyed this little ramble! I had fun writing it! Feel free to send in more questions if you have any :)

[sabianandocs]

10/10 Gaster lore! We definitely do wanna hear about the skelebros too! (Especially Papyrus!... or maybe that's just me lol)

Okay okay here I go (sorry this took forever)

Sort of chronological story stuff?

When Sans and Papyrus were first displaced by Gaster's dissolution into the fiber of the universe, Papyrus was only 11. He'd been homeschooled by his now unknown father, so he had a solid understanding of all the concepts he should have by that age- with a lot of oddly in depth science knowledge and a distinct lack of social knowledge (Something the whole family seems to share)

When the brothers moved to Snowdin, Sans got Papyrus set up with school and then spent most of his time working to provide for them both. He wasn't a neglectful older brother though, by any means, and even though he spent most of his waking hours earning a living for them, he still managed to support Papyrus in everything he wanted to do. Science fair project? He helped Pap set it up. School play? You bet your ass he was in the front row. Wants to do warrior training? Well, Sans isn't much help with that, but he'll sure try to weasel his way into making connections for it.

Papyrus was always super into puzzles. When he wasn't in school, he followed Sans to work, berated him for not putting enough effort into his puzzles, and then made them himself. (At some point, Sans noticed how happy it made Papyrus to have something to work on and started deliberately making awful and/or low effort puzzles so that Papyrus could fix them)

Papyrus learned about Undyne & the Royal Guard while in school, and obviously decided that the best possible future for himself was joining the royal guard- because everyone was talking about Undyne and nobody was talking to or about him so surely the problem here was just that he needed to be in the Guard so people would know how cool he was.

He waited outside Undyne's house all night to ask to join the guard, and while she appreciated his tenacity, he was still just a kid, and she wasn't going to let a kid join the guard. She did offer to train him in combat, though, and then later how to cook (because he'd get 'ripped into little smiling shreds' if he actually had to enter serious combat). He was insistent on being a part of the guard, though, so to try to mediate that desire she told him that he had to be a Royal Sentry, first, which was a very important and serious role and only the coolest people get to be sentries. Papyrus believes this wholeheartedly because, well, his brother is a sentry, and he's pretty cool.

So Papyrus made it his goal to sort of 'climb the ladder' of Royal Guard positions until he could become an official member. Sans and Undyne are both secretly hoping they can find some way to divert his passion to something else before he starts getting suspicious of their plans to keep him out of serious combat.

Papyrus Headcanons!

Papyrus has bad vision- I've seen this HC go around a lot, and I have to agree. Specifically, I think he has a lot of trouble seeing things far away and focusing on small text. He doesn't realize that this isn't normal, though- as far as he's concerned, that's just what the world looks like. (He wonders how and why people like reading so much, when one of the side effects is always a headache)

I also HC him as Asexual and Panromantic (I HC all the skeletons as some variant of ace, personally)

He's a huge optimist, and actively chooses to find the best in people even when there isn't really much to find. He's not naive or stupid, even though that can be how it comes across to some people, he just really believes that there's potential in everyone for good and maybe, just maybe if he shows that he believes that, he can bring it out in people.

--

This is all pretty loose and vague, cuz as far as my lore goes, Papyrus spends most of the 'backstory' sort of period being a kid in school and such. By the time he's old enough to be doing anything, most of it is hinted at within the game, and I like to stick pretty close to canon lore with anything that's actually established. I just fill in the gaps between that stuff!

[sabianandocs]

Do you have any interpretation about grillby or is he just a regular guy

Two for one!

I think he's just a regular guy, probably. Somebody has to be!

I've seen & appreciate headcanons that make him like, a war veteran from the Human/Monster war, but I personally prefer just letting him hang out. lol.

In contexts where he's being shipped with Sans, it makes the most sense to me for them to both be in their 30s/40s, and headcanons that have Grillby as a veteran would make him... at least a hundred? Probably more? Which would make it weird to ship him with Sans since the age gap would be so large (If we're going off the idea that Sans was 'created' in the Underground, by Gaster, at some point after the Core was created or in the process of being created.) (Same reason I don't super ship Soriel; she's just so much older than him (in my hc). Can totally see where people get it from though.). All these ideas obviously kind of rely heavily on other headcanons, so none of this is to say any other ideas are bad or wrong! Just how things look in my interpretation of the information I have and how I've extrapolated it.

But yeah my Grillby interpretation is that he was born in the Underground, grew up in Hotland (Established in the 2023 Spring newsletter!) and then moved to Snowdin to start his business- probably because Hotland & the capital were already pretty well-established in terms of food places/bars and Snowdin was not- when he was in his early 20s.

He's just doing his best to keep his bar running and live a humble life. All he really wants or needs is nice food, nice drinks, good company, maybe a good book. I'll have to do more thinking on hobbies and such for him, but I do think he probably enjoys watching House MD specifically because of this ask I got the other day. Maybe some old discs or VHS tape recordings of the show ended up in the junkyard and made their way to him somehow (I have my own idea for a shop that I've inserted into my Undertale stuff (in my head, has not made it into any art or anything yet) that gathers things from the dump and sells them in Snowdin).

I can see and understand interpretations that make him a dad (specifically to Fuku Fire), but my own personal biases kind of incline me to say he's just on his own. Partly because, come on, just cuz they're both made of fire doesn't mean they're related, they aren't even the same kind of flame- And they live in far separate ends of the Underground- But I digress.

I think he's just sort of hanging out by himself enjoying the simple comforts and pleasures of life.

Here's some baby Grillby and additional bits of lore!

(Transcript, because my handwriting isn't great:

Baby Grillby

Sometimes would be a little lion (favorite animal as a kid)

Eats combustibles as well as 'regular' food Paper for a quick boost (like an energy drink) Wood for a more filling meal

It is normal for elementals to experiment with their shape/form as kids/teens! Some elementals decide to stay in animal-style forms their whole lives, some stay humanoid, & some go back and forth. Grillby stays humanoid most of the time but might change form if he really wants to.)

[sabianandocs]

im so invested in your ut lore can you share more of the skelebros part of the doc pls 🙏🙏

Yes yes of course!! Sorry for the delay, life got ahead of me but here you go!

Copy-pasting directly from where I left off (which ended up kind of being a TLDR for the rest of the post, because I expand on it below)

'So they moved to Snowdin.  Sans was 17, Papyrus was 11.  Sans got his shit together for Papyrus’ sake and got a job as a sentry and sent Papyrus to school.

When Papyrus turned 16 he wanted to follow in Sans’ footsteps and be a sentry too, and so he applied.  He did not get the job because he was still a kid (Sans got the job because of extenuating circumstances…) and so he kept going to school but also set his sights further- he wanted to become part of the royal guard!!!  Which you.  Need to be a sentry first to get to do.  At least according to Sans & Undyne. '

^ That's all I had written in the direct continuation from the Gaster stuff, but it pretty much just vaguely covers the space between the last post and the 'current day' that the game takes place in. Like, super vaguely, so..

---

To expand on that a bit, since it's kind of sparse:

After Gaster's disappearance from their lives, Sans and Papyrus had basically nothing to work with. No knowledge of any details of their past, no connections anywhere, and the only cash they had was what was laying around the house that they & Gaster had lived in in the capital. Which was. Probably not a lot because Gaster was smart about money and had it in a bank or something probably. (Which all records of would likely have been erased alongside him)

Luckily for them, while the Underground does have a technical economy in 'g', they also function a lot on a help-people-first mentality, so the skelebros weren't going to end up completely screwed over. They couldn't stay in the capital- it's not really an ideal environment for a couple of (essentially) orphan kids, plus even with the generosity of folks it's expensive- so they looked around and Snowdin was the best choice- small, away from the big city, and with a decent amount of empty houses, since most monsters had wanted to move to the capital once it was established. Small town vibes! Relatively cheap!

The only sort of downside to moving into Snowdin was that everyone knew everyone, so everyone noticed when two random skeletons showed up one day and 'asserted themselves'.

Sans is really good at getting along with people though, so he pretty quickly made buddies with everyone and was accepted into the community. Papyrus, a little less so, but he was also just a kid so he got away with it. Also Sans would totally give you a death glare if you were mean to Papyrus so. Everyone was nice to him too.

Sans picked up odd jobs as soon as they moved to Snowdin, including the multiple sentry jobs he works in the game, in order to financially take care of himself and Papyrus. He made sure that Papyrus could focus on school and not have to worry about their situation.

Speaking of their situation.

Both of them have a hard time thinking about it. Not just like, metaphorically/emotionally, but literally. If they try to think too hard about their past, or to muster up any details of it, their minds completely give up on them. Sometimes it's headaches, sometimes it's sudden exhaustion, and, in Sans' case, because he refused to give up on trying to think about it & figure it out, sometimes blacking out entirely.

This sparked Sans' desire to figure out what exactly was going on with their lives. It was clear they weren't like everyone else, and something weird was going on with their past, but what?

In between working his jobs, helping Papyrus with homework, and mingling with the local community so they wouldn't see him & Papyrus as complete weirdo outcasts, Sans started studying what science books he could find. (A lot of it felt... oddly familiar)... He dug up material at the library, or the dump, and after a while started crafting his own theories too.

After years of studying, and teaching himself, -and even making friends with the royal scientist- etc etc, he managed to make his science machine. That weird thing in the room behind his house. And he discovered timelines. (I'm gonna say this is probably when he's around 28, Papyrus around 21. Ish. Subject to change)

His discovery sent him into a spiral. He'd never been an optimist or anything, but these findings are what really drove him to nihilism. He'd already had depression, but this certainly did not help. Papyrus noticed, obviously, and after a while Sans finally- reluctantly- showed him his findings.

Papyrus didn't take it super well either, at first. I don't think anyone would!! But he took a different approach to it than Sans did, and ended up sort of balancing it out-

Sans, as I said, took it extremely poorly and went full nihilist; 'nothing matters', 'everything is just going to be reset, what's the point?' etc.

Papyrus, on the other hand, came out of it with this conclusion: 'We're living in it anyway, there's nothing we can do to change it, so why dwell on it? Let's just live every day as best as we can. There's no point in dreading it.'

While Sans doesn't entirely buy in to Papyrus' system of thinking about it, having someone else who knew helped, and Papyrus was always there to encourage him to just be the happiest he can be and distract him from thinking about it too hard.

Since Sans is a scientist at heart and literally cannot just ignore and pretend it doesn't exist, he continues to study timelines and suchlike. Papyrus knows, and is there to drag him out when it gets to be too much mentally for Sans to handle. He listens when Sans needs to talk about it, but he avoids actively pursuing the knowledge himself. He deliberately chooses to be uninvolved, because as far as he's concerned, the only thing that's really being gained from this knowledge is distress.

Here's another chunk from my google doc in the section where I'm just rambling that kind of says the same thing I just did but I still want to include it:

"Sans and Papyrus both have awareness of resets.  Not in-depth memory or knowledge, and they can’t remember details, but they get deja vu and occasionally visions or flashbacks.  Sans has figured out how to project timelines and view the current one via his science machine thing, so he knows knows how many times they’ve been reset and etc.  Papyrus knows, but he chooses not to get involved in the science and prediction because he wants to enjoy life whatever way the timeline is going- some would call it blissful ignorance.  Sans is too anxious to leave it, and it sends him spiralling more than he’d like to admit.  

Papyrus is an optimist- some would call him naive, but he’s not as ignorant as he seems.  He just chooses to view the world in a more positive way and deliberately ignores the deeper complexities; he chooses peace of mind.

Sans is a pessimist and nihilist.  He’s too scientifically-minded to not research the anomalies in the timeline once he discovered them, and unfortunately that takes a toll on his mental health.  He was never a super optimistic person or anything, he always had a twinge of mental illness, but his findings exacerbated it.  Papyrus keeps him from falling too deep into it.  

Sans & Papyrus are very codependent.  Obviously they are capable of existing apart from each other, but they are, in a way, literally two halves of a whole.  Sans is good at seeing the worst in people, Papyrus is good at seeing the best in people.  Sans is super low energy, Papyrus is super high energy.  Sans is a pessimist, Papyrus is an optimist.  They kind of need each other to even each other out.  "

You could dig into how perhaps the means of their creation led to their extreme opposing ways of seeing the world, but..

I'm gonna stop myself there because this is already getting really long! I have another ask sitting in my inbox right now asking for more about Papyrus so my next long rambly post will be going a little more in depth on what he was up to while Sans was melting his brain with science stuff.

I hope you enjoyed!

None of this is like, set in stone or anything, I might still change stuff around, but this gives an idea of the sort of ideas I'm coming from/building off of with the rest of my stuff.