#tkbtm

[drundertalescum]

The Kings Beneath The Mountain - Fic Questions

SOOOO...

@audaciousanonj asked a few questions, and then @rabbitpietale decided to challenge me to do ALL the questions for this fic, so I’m doing all the questions for this fic.

Please send me questions for not-this-fic.

I’ll put it under the cut. It’s long.

1: What inspired you to write the fic this way?

I was in an angst mood and started writing for a few hours and ended up with a huge, disconnected mess. A week later I decided to publish the first part since it was pretty solid and could stand on its own. Then I made the mistake of trying to continue before I was really ready for it.

I don’t really remember the exact inspiration for the first night of mad typing. It was probably a migraine. That’s the cause of most fics I write down.

2: What scene did you first put down?

HONESTLY? It’s a scene way in the future. Like... 20 chapters ahead if it continues at the pace I want to? I’ve got doubts about going down that route for a few reasons, so there’s a chance the fic will divert before it ever gets there, but it’s... uh... it’s really not pleasant.

Maybe if I do divert I’ll spin that off into another fic. I do really like the scene. I just... I dunno. Self doubts.

3: What's your favorite line of narration?

It’s a paragraph, not a line, but this:

Undyne would have known what to do. She knew all sorts of things about magic, and about Asgore, too! She knew how he handled things, the way he made it all work. This was knowledge he desperately needed now. And it just would have been lovely hear her stories and share a cup of tea! (Papyrus himself hated tea, but he drank it all the time now. Asgore must have had good reason for drinking the stuff. Which flowers did he use again…? He was so forgetful lately.) They didn't have to spar or cook or do any of the stuff they used to. They could just chat or walk around the garden and reminisce about older, better times. His joints hurt so much; that sounded more appealing. She'd probably think it was boring, but he could make it fun! She could play piano for him and he could try to sing along. They should have done that more. It was fun. Or maybe they could watch some of those baby cartoons together. He didn't know which one was her favorite, and he felt now that he'd really like to know.

I just love their friendship so much and it hurts knowing how much he missed her and how much he was ignoring about his own self-destruction while still thinking about her opinions and ways to spend more time with her.

I also like this ultra secret future snippet:

Creativity was always strongly associated with humans, and for good reason.  Papyrus had seen so many old maps and books about human buildings and architecture. If, with unlimited time and resources, you asked a single human to build you two great cities, you would get exactly that: two cities. Different streets, different buildings, different names. A monster, on the other hand, would just build the same city twice. After all, the first was fine, wasn't it? There was no reason to betray tradition-- even if it was a tradition of just a few short days.

There’s another actual line that might be my favorite but it’s spoilers.

4: What's your favorite line of dialogue?

Of what’s currently written:

“WOWIE, UNDYNE! I DIDN'T KNOW THERE WERE FRIEND RULES!” “OBVIOUSLY! That's rule number two of the Friend Rules!!” “AND WHAT'S NUMBER ONE?” “‘Don't talk about Friend Rules!’” “BUT YOU JUST--!!!”

I also like: 

COOLSKELETON95: THERE ARE LOTS OF THINGS FOR BABIES THAT ARE STILL VERY GOOD FOR GROWN MONSTERS! LIKE MILK! AND DEADLY SPIKES!

ALPHYS: * ummmmm * spikes!?

COOLSKELETON95: OF COURSE! KIDS LOVE SPIKES!!!

There’s a conversation way down the line that I love (part of the sequence that might get cut that I mentioned) but the whole thing is spoiler-town.

5: What part was hardest to write?

The next chapter. (:

I’m serious. It’s awful. I thought  I would be able to get it done months ago! It’s not really all that hard, it’s just finding a balance, because the way the scene plays out really determines the direction of the story in a lot of ways. It’s just the chat with Undyne, it’s not some big surprise, but it’s hard! It doesn’t seem to want to work out right! And I get overwhelmed when I try to work on it.

The dinner with Sans was really tough, to, and the conversation that followed dinner. I didn’t want to give too much away from what Sans was thinking or what he’s aware of and that made it pretty tricky getting the dialogue to not go the wrong way.

The brothers actually wanted to talk things out and this is an Undertale fanfiction. It cannot be allowed.

6: What makes this fic special or different from all your other fics?

It’s really long.

And uh... aside from Papyrus and Alphys friendship showing a bit it hasn’t really reached any of the “different” parts yet. 

Fun fact though: pretty much every detail of the King Papyrus ending Papyrus came from is the reverse of the details of my other (planned) King Papyrus fic Observe:

TKBTM:

Fell down 9 months in

Aborted genocide run

not Frisk’s first rodeo

features at least 2 timelines

Papyrus banned himself from sleeping

Papyrus has near-perfect reset memory (from origin timeline to new timeline)

Flowey died in Origin timeline

KPCV:

Takes place 1 year into reign

“Coward” run

the first Frisk run

the only Frisk run

Papyrus sleeps whenever he can he gets it now

No reset memory, only deja vu

Flowey lives

7: Where did the title come from?

It’s a reference to Asgore’s intro-to-battle music, which translates to The King Beneath The Mountain. Only there’s plural kings. Because Papyrus is also a king.

It’s really clever, you see. I’m really good at names.

8: Did any real people or events inspire any part of it?

Naw, not this one. This one is just pure self-indulgent fulfillment of my Papyrus angst needs.

9: Were there any alternate versions of this fic?

Not really! There’s a lot of scenes that I changed or cut and by the end of it there may be a very different ending than the self-indulgent trash I was aiming for but right now its not that far.

Here’s a cut part of the scene where Sans and Papyrus are goofing off after Papyrus throws a glove at Sans’s face. Originally he missed:

“i feel so attacked right now. i better get going before you start throwing your boots too. ‘m weak, not sure my sole can handle it!”

“ARRRGHHH!!!” Sans had shortcut a short distance away before the shoe could properly land, as both knew he would.  They’d played this game many times, but it never got old. If anything, it only got better with time. It was hard for Papyrus to maintain his look of great offense while he was holding back a giggle. He started to chase after him, using his magic to prevent himself from tripping from having only one shoe.  “GET BACK HERE!!”

“i wouldn’t do that! you’re running a temperature!” Sans dodged out of the path of the second shoe before it even came close. “later!” Sans yelled from his spot down the road, then shortcut out of sight once more, this time for good.

Papyrus smiled as he floated above the ground and gathered up the strewn pieces of his gear.

10: Why did you choose this pairing for this particular story?

There’s no pairings here besides maybe one or two if-you-squints in the future. And one of those squints is... really not a healthy relationship if you read it as a relationship. Please don’t ship that.

11: What do you like best about this fic?

This isn’t clear yet but it’s super self-indulgent on my favorite tropes.

12: What do you like least about this fic?

This isn’t clear yet but it’s super self-indulgent on my favorite tropes.

13: What music did you listen to, if any, to get in the mood for writing this story? Or if you didn't listen to anything, what do you think readers should listen to to accompany us while reading?

hmmm....

You know, I don’t really listen to music when I write. It doesn’t work. (Conversely, I MUST listen to music while I draw). I can’t remember what I was listening to around the time of writing, since music usually plays a role in brainstorming.

Maybe a nice, soft, sad orchestral ASGORE. Or if it exists, a soft, sad, orchestral ASGORE/Bonetrousle mashup.

14: Is there anything you wanted readers to learn from reading this fic?

Sleep is healthy.

15: What did you learn from writing this fic?

“Nope! Still can’t handle longfics! A pity!”

[drundertalescum]

ble

just a quick update! To the people who’ve sent me different theories and stuff this week, I haven’t been ignoring you, don’t worry! I just have had the attention span of a… I’m not even sure of a good analogy really. It’s a miracle i got anything done at all. I’ve started replies to everything i’ve gotten in my inbox this week (anything that’s not a art request thing, at least, though most of those are also started) but i keep getting distracted or running out of steam mid-reply.

I’m not really sure what it is that’s the problem but hopefully next week will be better!

[drundertalescum]

not trying to make you anxious or anything but uhhhhh how many wips do you have? not including stuff from literally years ago that i'll never get around to, i have about 16.

UH WELL

I’ll be honest, I have no idea. I have everything from “I wrote about 200 words in this doc the other day because i had a scene in mind” to “heres 3 future chapters of TKBTM that I can’t use” and all of them are sort of floating around in poorly labeled google docs.

I have my dump fic where I tossed a lot of WIPs I didn’t think were going anywhere any time soon, and there’s 50ish there I think if you discount the stuff thats a part of the same WIP, and SURVIVE which I tossed in there because it was a little too dark for me.

Plus about 20 other WIPs that I never put in there because they’re newer or I thought they were more viable? 

That’s 70. So roughly a WIP for every published fic.

so…

huh.

wow.

…You know if I didn’t try to math this out I would have guessed I had about 10.

[drundertalescum]

What if Papyrus from The Kings Beneath the Mountain met His Huglessness (the Overlord Papyrus you've been developing recently)? How far diverged are they? Would KBtM Pap have gone the same way if he hadn't fallen down or did he successfully resist that temptation/avert that path? Would KBtM talk his counterpart around or join him in his methods? Hope you have a lovely evening.

ooooooh man you just hit me with a great question

(for the sake of clarity: TKBTM Papyrus is gonna be “Papyrus” and Overlord Papyrus “Overlord.” I considered calling TKBTM boy “Sleepy” but that felt a little mean)

I do wanna clarify for the record that Overlord Papyrus is mostly @officiallilith‘s terrible tyrant boy but I am having fun playing around with him because antagonistic Papyrus is a rare and beautiful gem to be treasured. I’m a big fan of playing with the balance of a character’s personality to put them in an entirely new role and alignment so this is very much my jam.

THAT BEING SAID 

If I got off my butt and worked on TKBTM, the answer to your question would change multiple times as Papyrus reevaluates his own run and where things went wrong (beyond “got sick and died whoopsie doopsie”), and boy did things go wrong in his reign. Some of that was very much his bad; other things were out of his control (the human did a LOT of violence). Papyrus really hasn’t had the chance, as of this point in the fic, to decompress and analyze where things went or where they may have gone.

So meeting his No Hugs counterpart, I think he’d see an Underground that’s in far better shape than his was, with a king who’s willing to make the kinds of hard choices he questions his ability to make. So I think there’s a good chance he sees it as “well I guess that’s how you rule a successful kingdom…”

But the difference is that TKBTM Papyrus is neither bitter nor detatched like the Overlord is. He deprived himself of sleep and regular meals and everything resembling “basic personal maintenance and self care” to try to make things better for his kingdom and everyone in it, and restore EVERYONE’S hope, not just a few. He never reaped the benefits of power. The crown was nothing but burden and responsibility for him, which is a very important deviation. He also had a closer relationship with Sans to ground him, though there was strain there, too.

I think he would eventually start to see the tears at the seams of what Overlord is attempting to do and realize that it isn’t something he can condone, but I do think it would take him quite a bit of time to really get there. 

A few more notes on this topic before I sleep:

I’m imagining Overlord’s timeline as being a middle of the road kind of ending, where things weren’t really devestated and a genocide run was never initiated, so the human looks a lot more like “a friend” at first and an enemy later, whereas TKBTM’s King Papyrus branch was in an aborted geno run that stopped at sparing Papyrus, and practically continued with a high death count after. Overlord’s version lends more easily to feelings of betrayal and bitterness, whereas TKBTM’s branch is more based in guilt at not having guided them towards good enough to prevent a greater loss of life.

I think Overlord delegates out duties and tasks a LOT more than TKBTM Papyrus does. Papyrus tries to tackle every problem himself, qualified or not, while Overlord probably tries to go to the best person for the job. Things go smoother, there’s less stress thanks to the lower amount of personal involvement and investment. Overlord detaches and delegates. TKBTM Papyrus takes every task (and its failure or success) personally, which is predictably not always great for his well-being…

Overlord has a LOT more respect than TKBTM Papyrus ever has. While the commanding fear aspects might be a negative to TKBTM Pap, he would also likely see all respect as a sign that his counterpart is doing a good job of restoring hope to the people

TKBTM Papyrus would definitely get why Overlord hates hugs but he would probably take it upon himself to hug anyone who needs it because he’s a cool dude

[drundertalescum]

Four options for tonight:

Get the echo asks queued up on the blog and start the new batch

Write the prompt for today, especially since I just figured out how to make it way better on myself

Try to force the next chapter of TKBTM together from one of the like... 9 drafts of the next chapter before midnight so i won’t go a year without updating, on a technicality

Finish Stars Stones And Stellar Remnants since there is a plot to backstab me and post the unfinished draft on AO3 for me on the Ides of March

So what am I doing?

Trying to figure out how to set about installing FO4 and Skyrim on my secondary drive.

[drundertalescum]

I’ve been listening to the song 'Death of a Batchelor' by Panic!At the Disco and think that it’s perfect for Papyton.

OH NO.

That entire album has inspired 2 different ideas for me. One was an OC for a game my friend ended up not hosting, and the other was 2 full chapters of TKBTM... which are so far ahead of the story where it is now that I can’t post them!!! Even though they’re written!!!!

Two different things I can’t actually use or share came out of that album and I’m mad about it. The Angry Album.

But I agree, good Papyton song

[drundertalescum]

asks for fanfic writers: 3, 4, 14, 27, 29, 33 for Equals, 40, 46, 48 for TKBtM

3 - name three favorite writers

I can’t narrow it to 3 so I’m just gonna come back to this at a later date.

4 - name three authors that were influential to your work and tell why

TRICKY!

@maximum-overboner​ if only for writing I’m Feeling Fine, Kid, which reignited my interest in reading and fanfiction and writing in general. But her writing is just SO GOOD. The dialogue, the humor, the angst, the visceral style. It’s just really great writing that I find very inspiring.

RL Stine - I haven’t reread any of his books in years to actually see if there’s an influence or not, but when I was a kid, my cousin gave me a box of hand-me-down Fear Street books and I made it my mission to read them all over the course of a summer. At the time, I wasn’t much of a reader, but you give me something spooky and I’m suddenly interested. I had my nose in those books all summer and it kickstarted a lot of story and novel ideas. None of them were particularly GOOD, but they still fueled that fire.

Daniel Keyes - Flowers For Algernon was my favorite thing we had to read in school. BAR NONE. I think my love of steam of conscience and identity struggles and mental changes all came from that (especially the short story). It’s definitely really apparent in a lot of my more angsty works.

14 - easiest character to write

Papyrus. I dunno why, I can just get into his headspace better than any other character. Doesn’t even matter if its an AU.

27 - best review you ever got

AHHH This is hard but

@uselessundertalefacts​‘s review on Equals which made me SO HAPPY and solidified my decision to keep writing BUT I WAS SO FLUSTERED I DIDN’T REPLY AND I FEEL BAD. I AM VERY BAD AT REPLYING TO REVIEWS BUT I LOVE THEM ALL AND AM VERY GRATEFUL.

29 - favorite story/poem of another author

I don’t want to be creepy and say I’m Feeling Fine, Kid again so I’m going to plug my favorite ongoing fics (since I only bookmark collected works or collections or things I don’t expect to ever update.

These are the fics that I rush to read whenever they update no matter what I’m doing:

@redkammy​‘s Desiderium

@andydemayonnaise​​‘s Not A Knife Feeling

@spookyspaghettiskeleton​ ‘s The Walls Around Our Hearts + Papyrus vs the Forces of LOVE

friends_call_me_wobbly_hands’s A Lifetime Too Late which is a sequel to Eleven Days

33 - alternate ending for Equals

Changes was an attempt at writing one of the alternate ending ideas I had for Equals while still sort of keeping it standing on its own. It was also a possible alternate ending to The Kings Beneath The Mountain! I don’t really like it though.

40 - which one of your stories would you most like to see as a movie/series

Stars Stones and Stellar Remnants (aka rocktale) works the best as a movie, probably. The others are either very introspective or a single scene. The only other series is another non-published fic.

46 - share a scene of a story that you haven’t published yet

This probably isn’t getting published here you go its Underfell:

The second war with the humans had ended rather quickly.

No matter how powerful monsters had become in their isolation, no matter how violent, no matter how much they craved the blood of humanity… monsters were still too weak and too few. Monsters had magic, but humans had weapons. Not knives or sticks or swords but guns and bullets and missiles and bombs, and most of all, worst of all, they had souls, human souls, free of corruption, free of hopelessness and a monster's natural desperation.

Humans were incredibly powerful.

Monsters could not complete. They never really could.

It was a tough lesson to have to learn twice.

Papyrus had not planned to be taken alive. Not really. Undyne had always preached the sort of death and glory talk that saw most of their comrades killed early on. Undyne herself had not fallen easily, taking as much of the glory as she could before the death. The humans had tried so many times.

He'd really thought she was unkillable.

But he'd once thought things could get better, too, hadn't he?

No, he didn't want to be taken alive. He wanted to be like Undyne. He'd always wanted to be like Undyne.

But deeper in his heart, further back, a younger Papyrus hadn't wanted to be like Undyne. He'd wanted to be like Sans. His brother. The one who told him to survive, survive, survive. Always, always survive. No matter what the cost, no matter how much it hurts, you need to survive. You need to fight, but you need to live. You can fix what breaks, you can make your apologies, you can live whatever life you want, but only if you survive.

survive, papyrus. promise me you'll do whatever it takes to survive.

So he did.

He abandoned his plans to turn to dust when the humans came for the survivors. They'd found him.

Only him.

He remembered how one of them laughed. A damned skeleton was the only thing still alive.

Papyrus thought he knew every skeleton joke there was, but he didn't understand why that one was supposed to be funny.

48 - three spoilers for The Kings Beneath The Mountain

Next chapter Undyne and Papyrus talk about stuff

Toriel exists

sad shit

[drundertalescum]

What ever happened to a tale of two papyrus

A Tale of Two Papyruses

So far not too much! It’s something I want to write eventually, just haven’t been in a good spot to handle a longfic! (I’m already not handling TKBTM very well). 

On my Ideas list (which I’m probably gonna update tonight after I post this, not changing anything, just adding) “without.” is actually the current working title of the actual fic for those AUs.

without. - (Double Original AU) (Sans-centric) When something goes awry, Sans wakes up trapped between two parallel worlds, both of which he never existed in…

Technically the fic is Sans-centric/Sans’s POV but heavily about the Papyruses.

The idea is, after A Bad Thing happens, Sans ends up erased from the timeline, but something destabilized things and split the timeline in two, with Sans drifting back and forth between them without much control.

In one, Papyrus is the Royal Scientist. Geeky, insecure, shy, but overall pretty close to canon, if lacking in the confidence, real or faked. He’s never had a family, but while it sometimes shows, he’s adjusted fairly well. He goes by Dr. Papyrus, since he never had a last name to speak of. 

In the other, he’s cold and harsh and nothing like the Papyrus Sans knew. He’s the acting Royal Scientist, but not technically the official one. He’s filling in for his father while he’s “away on extended leave.” Everyone is pretty sure that’s a euphamism for “Dr. Gaster the Younger dissolved the Elder’s dust in acid.” No one is particularly upset by this.

...Except Sans when he hears that rumor, of course.

[drundertalescum]

drowsy promises

Okay making implied promises is the last thing i wanna do at 6am after taking meds and being super drowsy and also being sick but i feel like squaring away at least one of my many ideas tomorrow so uh...

more Fuzzy Wuzzy?

more Echo?

a dumb Underfell meets Undertale comic?

a VERY dumb undyne and papyrus comic? (basically a shitpost)

actually trying to do more ficlets?

trying to update TKBTM? (if this is what you want you’re gonna have a disappointment)

something else that im forgetting???

[drundertalescum]

someone please ask me about some of my one shots (or rocktale; why the hell not)

i have to reread TKBTM because the entire thing has gone blank for me

[drundertalescum]

rambling

Me during normal human hours: 

No motivation

everything is Too Much

reclusive, constantly forgetting to reply

flaking out on plans

DEEP SIGH

when will it be socially acceptable for me to sleep

Me at 4:14AM:

Why is no one around I want to talk to people

This town drunk AU is so good?? I should write stuff for it

no i should write stuff for TKBTM

nah wait on that i’m definitely sleeping soon i can’t start that

...I CAN’T SLEEP THERE IS TOO MUCH TO DO!!!

I should flesh out a sequel to Lost Dog

future’s so bright i gotta wear shades

time i boot up photoshop so i can do the things!

wait heck i gotta sleep

[drundertalescum]

I’m so desperate to fill up the queue without having to tag my drafts that I’m posting this. I was bored a few months ago and tried playing dress-up with Pappy. This is one of two. The other is a spoiler for another fanwork that Idon’t own, so it’s not getting posted until the fanwork gets to that point.

In my non-TKBTM king pap idea, he commissions people across the underground to get him some snazzy new clothes (because he can’t bear wearing Asgore’s robes any longer) so he ends up with a warddrobe full of things various monsters think kings should wear. 

So here we have King Henry VIII Pap, being a cutie.

[drundertalescum]

12, 38

12 - Favorite Place to Write

I’m not sure I have a favorite place? I guess technically the most writing I do is when I’m laying in bed burrowed under the covers, swyping away at my phone frantically. Things seem to flow easier when I write on my phone. It just means I end up with a lot of auto-correction errors to go back and fix! (And for SOME REASON character names will not STICK as custom additions to my dictionary.

Passports is anyways getting underneath messages from Alpha

38 - Do You Reread Your Own Stories?

When I’m actually writing them, constantly. You have no idea how many times I’ve read my one fic that’s been sitting in my WIPs since the same time I wrote Equals. (so like 3-4 months) I actually actively hate it now because I’ve read it too much, so that’s probably 10k down the drain (: 

After I finish I usually reread once or twice after a story is finished and then post it… then reread multiple times after it’s published to make sure it doesn’t suck. I ended up doing an emergency reorganizing on TKBTM Chapter 2 because of this but only one hit came in between publishing and rearranging. 

After THAT though, I’m usually so sick of what I’ve written I never want to see it again.