Undyne POV:

After meeting with Brian, Mitts and I then went back to the Waterfall to the area we said we'd meet with Alphys at, it being a bit of water near my house to the west. I had to change into my bathing suit first, as did Mitts, which he simply just went in what he called 'swimming shorts'.

"Okay, now we wait for Alphys," Mitts smiled, me nodding at that as we took a dip in the water and I shivered at the coldness of the water. "Is it really that cold? Let me handle this, Undyne," Mitts smirked, me wondering what he was doing, but then he smirked widely. "CANNONBALL!" he exclaimed as he then jumped off the edge and directly into the water curled up into a ball! I gawked at how awesome that was!

"Wow! That was impressive! HAHA!" I smirked at Mitts as he emerged and I smiled at how he was shivering, but smiling at the same time.

"Yeah, but ya weren't kidding about the chill. It's probably about 40 degrees or so. Not really the proper temperature for cold blooded monsters," Mitts smiled, me smirking at him.

"Actually, Mitts, most monsters are warm blooded with very few exceptions. Some residents of Hotland are cold blooded, which makes Hotland the ideal setting for them to live in," said the voice of Alphys as she appeared from behind us and I saw she was also in a swimsuit, only her's was a one piece suit that covered most of her body.

"Hey, Alphy, you just missed what Mitts calls a 'cannonball'! It was wicked!" I smirked widely.

"Really? Heh, watch this," Alphys smirked as she then got a running start and yelled the same thing as Mitts did. "CANNONBALL!" she shouted as she then landed in the water the same way Mitts did, only she made a much bigger splash! I smirked at this and decided to do the same thing, me getting a running start from much further back, by the center flower bed by my house. "CAAAANNNOOOONNNN BALLLLL!" I exclaimed loudly as I then leaped into the water with all my might, my splash being much bigger as I saw that I'd actually forced some of the water onto the shore, me smiling at how Mitts and Alphys watched with smiles on their faces.

"You win, Undyne. Your prize is explaining something to Alphys, now that you got her buttered up," Mitts said, me slapping my face at how he worded that as Alphys looked a bit worried.

"Huh? What do you mean by 'buttered me up'?" Alphys asked.

"It's not anything relating to food, it's just a figure of speech. It means that Undyne made you at ease," Mitts said, Alphys sighing in relief at that, which is when my smile formed.

"You really thought I'd literally lather butter over you, Alphy? That's pretty funny!" I smirked, her smirking and blushing a bit at that. "But in all seriousness, I do have something I want to tell you." I then swam over to her and took her hand, Alphy gasping at it as I then looked her in the eyes with a flutter of my eyes, Alphy's breath getting a bit hot at that.

"U-Undyne..." Alphys panted.

"Alphys, I want to come out and say this. I like you, like, a whole lot. Like how Mew Mew Kissy Cutie likes snail ice cream," I said, Alphys smirking at that.

"So... you... want us to be... a couple?" she asked with blush on her face as I could literally see hearts emerge in her eyes.

"Yes, I want us to be a romantic couple. That's why I had Mitts come along. I needed him for backup in case you got too nervous," I said, Alphys smirking at me as she then went to me and kissed me on my lips, me gasping at that. It was rare that Alphys ever took initiative to anything unless it had to do with science! So the fact that she was the first to kiss me was really surprising.

"I'd love to be your girlfriend, but only if you can be my girlfriend," Alphys smiled at me, which made me blush, something that only she could ever do to me.

"I accept!" I smirked as I then lifted her out of the water and hugged her, me kissing her on the lips after and Alphys giggling as we then shared multiple pecks with each other.

"Get a room, love birds," Mitts smirked, me groaning at him.

"Don't you have something else to do now that your job's done?" I smirked at him.

"Now that you mention it, I think I'm gonna go visit Shyren and Shyster. They could use some company," Mitts smiled.

"Good luck getting any of them to talk, Mitts. They're not called Shyren and Shyster for nothing. Both of them are incredibly shy," Alphys smirked.

"Unless you happen to have some kind of musical talent and you can hum a tune well. They love singing more than talking," I smirked.

"Sounds like a challenge, one that I'm happy to accept," Mitts smiled as he then swam to the other side of the water and proceeded to go off to the Shy sisters' house.

"I think you're starting to rub off on him," Alphys smiled at me.

"Hey, do you think that, if you want, we could go to my place and I can butter you up in other ways? It's sure to be very pleasurable," I smirked at her, Alphys blushing and nodding immediately at that.

"Yes, yes, AND MORE YES!" she said with a squeak in her voice.


August 26th, 203X

Asriel POV:

It had been about two months since Brian had come down to the Underground, and wouldn't you know it, the first place he thought of as a place to live was with Gaster. I became a bit worried about why he chose to live with Gaster, especially after we'd warned him of time machine creation, though from what Asgore mentioned, the time machine project was still abandoned. But I, however, felt anxious. I talked with Chara about it and she agreed we needed to pay a visit to make absolutely sure.

"Let's go on our own, this time," Chara said, me nodding at that as we then told mom we were going out to get groceries (which wasn't a lie at all, because we really were going to do that after visiting Gaster) and she nodded at us with a smile on her face.

"Be safe, my children," mom smiled at us as we then went on our way to the CORE, then on the way to Gaster's place, where we knocked on the door and rang the doorbell twice. And after waiting a bit, we got an answer from Brian himself.

"Huh? Princess Chara and Prince Asriel? What do I owe the pleasure of your visitation?" Brian asked, his words still being a bit complex for me to grasp at times.

"We wanted to ask if we could have a look around Gaster's lab. Just to check in with how his inventions are going," Chara asked.

"Of course I'll let you in," Brian smiled as he then opened the door for us and we then saw that Gaster was actually currently taking care of Papyrus and Sans, both of them growing older by the day. They were now just a foot shorter than I was and they were already starting to learn how to talk and we then learned their mannerisms.

Sans was very lazy and was almost always either sleeping or simply crawling at the slowest pace imaginable, but he always smiled when doing so. And Papyrus was much more rambunctious and was always getting into trouble, as seen when he tried to pull off the tablecloth from the floor and Gaster had to stop him from doing so.

"As you can tell... Papyrus is the harder of the children to control," Brian said, me smiling at that as Gaster noticed our presence as he then started to speak his normal speak.

"I sEe yOu visIt Us agAIn, yoUNg PrincE aND pRinCEsS," Gaster smiled at us as his eyes got black and gooey again, which Brian was unfazed by, but it still gave me goosebumps.

"Do you think we could have a look around your lab real quick? We wanted to see how your projects are coming along," I smiled at him, Gaster nodding with a smile on his face.

"bUT of coURse. BriAn, CouLD yoU wAtCh tHe tOTs wHIle i'M in thE lAb?" Gaster asked with a smile.

"Indubitably," Brian said, me smacking my face at that.

"English, please?" I groaned.

"That is English. It's a more brainy way of saying 'yes'," Chara smirked slyly as we then proceeded to the elevator with Gaster and we went down in it to the lab, where we saw that there were a few monsters in the hospital section that looked to be in bad shape. One of them was Shyster, the sister of Shyren. And she didn't really look too good.

"Shyster?" I asked, her turning her head over to me with a small smile.

"P-Prince..." she said with a small cough. "I... I'm not much longer... for this world..." Shyster said, Chara looking down with tears escaping her eyes.

"Don't tell me... you got hurt badly, huh?" I asked her as I noticed there was a pretty big gash on her tail fin.

"I... I got scared by a bad dream... and I swam down the stream in the dark... I got hurt by a sharp rock... it really hurts..." Shyster said as Chara put her hand to Shyster's head and slowly pet her.

"It's okay, Shyster... you'll be okay," Chara said as she then did something surprising. She made a small cut on her finger from a nearby scalpel, which not only spooked me, but Gaster as well!

"W-Wait, what are you doing?" I asked in confusion. Chara didn't answer as she simply put a drop of her blood into Shyster's mouth, Shyster groaning a bit from it as Chara then looked at her with a smile.

"I don't know if it'd help, but just have a drop of my blood and call me in the morning. It's enriched with Determination. Only a drop, though," Chara said, me only then understanding what was going on. Chara was trying to save Shyster with a bit of her own Determination! But she was doing it by feeding it to her, which I was confused at before I remembered that monster souls were pretty much infused with every bit of the monster they inhabited. And I knew that she only gave a drop to Shyster because of the issue of the Amalgamates from the future world having gotten tons of Determination injections.

"WhAt aRe yOU DoiNG?" Gaster asked in confusion.

"I just want to see if this ends up working. I just have a hunch that, with a bit of Determination, Shyster can survive this injury," Chara said as we then saw that Shyster closed her eyes and started to go to sleep, Gaster adjusting his tie a bit.

"vEry weLL... Let US be oFF agAiN," Gaster frowned as he then led us to the invention room and we saw for ourselves that, indeed, the time machine was completely busted. And as for the return device that was brought to our timeline? Chara destroyed that in the same way she destroyed Flowey's Determination extract. The lava surrounding Hotland.

"Thanks for listening to us and abandoning the work on the time machine, Gaster... it would've been very problematic if it were to malfunction," I said with a sigh. But Gaster's response.

"I kNow oF yOUr enDeaVORs WiTh tHosE oF thE aLTernATe timeLInes, cHilDreN," Gaster said, that making our smiles fade into pure dumbstruck shock.

"H-How did... how did you know?" Chara gawked.

"RemEMbeR thaT maCHinE thAT detECts abNormALItiEs in spaCE aND tiMe?" he asked, me nodding as did Chara, before she gasped.

"Wait... is that why you were so willing to abandon the project after we asked you to? Because you knew about... the first one to travel back in time?" Chara asked.

"yEs... thE mAChiNe iN quEsTioN iS thIs oNe," Gaster said as he pointed to a machine made out of a sonar that looked to be made of similar parts of the time machine.

"ThiS soNAr detECts abNOrmaLIties in ThE SpaCE-TimE flOW. iT aLSo sCaNS tHe BioSignAtuRES oF thEsE abNORMalIties. I Knew mY SAns CamE froM thaT hoRRId fuTUre to wARn uS... aND thE TRUE idenTitiES Of KrisTOF aNd CorAlIne," Gaster said, me looking at him in curiosity.

"Then why didn't you tell us anything?" I asked him.

"BeCAusE... yOu ArE sTrONG. MucH StroNGeR tHAn anYoNE iN thIS tiMELiNe. I kNeW PriNCeSs ChaRa cOulD bEsT hEr fuTurE sElF... AnD yOu BoaStIng aBouT thE counTEr tO hEr EraSURe mOve? I AssiSteD wiTh tElEkinEsiS fRoM AfaR... sO yOu'rE wELcoME," Gaster said, Chara sighing at that bit.

"Dammit... and here I thought I was stronger than my future self... but hey, at least me and the other humans were tough enough to defeat Omega Flowey on our own!" Chara smiled.

"Yeah, but you were the one who warned us about the abnormality, so, in reality, it was you who helped us find out where to strike!" I deduced.

"YeS... yOu maY nEvER unDerStaNd hoW i dO thIngS thE waY I do thEM... bUt kNow thAt I wIlL aLWaYs asSiSt iF evEr yOu gEt in A baD SituATioN," Gaster said, me smiling at him and hugging him at that, Gaster being a bit surprised at that and me not even caring that I was getting his black goo on me.

"Thanks, Mister Gaster... thank you so much," I smiled at him as I then looked at Chara and she smiled as she then saw that there were also some other things nearby, those being different inventions of varying kinds.

"Could you tell me what the heck this thing is? It looks unique," Chara smiled, Gaster smirking at that as I then walked with him to the invention. It was unlike anything I'd ever seen. It was some kind of machine that looked like a heart and with a lot of different chemicals next to it.

"AH yeS... I'vE bEEn tRyiNG tO fIGurE oUt hOW tO cREatE sOulS artiFICiallY, thoUgH tHe ProCEss iS goInG a BiT slOw," Gaster said, Chara smiling at that.

"Well, so long as it doesn't involve testing on living creatures, I'm okay with that," Chara said with a smile.

"Agreed," I said as well. But then, once we were leaving through the hospital area again, we were surprised when we saw Shyster was up and about and she was swimming in the air and singing like she'd never sung before!

"Shyster!" I smirked at her, the fish monster gleefully swimming up to me, Chara, and Gaster with a smile.

"Thank you, Princess Chara! That stuff you gave me really did the trick! I got all healed up after just a short nap! And I feel rejuvenated! Like, I feel excited to be alive!" Shyster said with glee at me and Chara, Gaster being very confused at this, but a smile still on his face.

"So you know, Gaster, I think this may be a side job I could do if you ever get anymore serious cases in this clinic. Just a drop of my blood was enough to heal Shyster from death's door, but just in case, she may need to stay for a couple more days, just to make sure nothing happens," Chara said.

"Aw! But I want to go see my sis!" Shyster said with glee.

"Trust me, Shyster, we need to make sure that nothing bad happens. After all, that drop of blood was filled with Determination, which is much more plentiful in humans than monsters, which is why it takes longer for humans to turn into dust than it does to monsters. It's just a precaution to be positive that no permanent side effects will happen as a result," Chara said, Shyster sighing and nodding at that.

"Fine, I'll be a good girl and stay here for three days. If nothing happens, then can I go back home?" Shyster asked, me nodding at that.

"Of course you can," I smiled at her. But I knew what Chara's concern was about. The Amalgamates. Shyster was a part of one of the Amalgamates known as Lemonbread, which was a fusion of Shyster, Aaron's brother, and a Moldbygg. I had to wonder if just one drop of blood would make Shyster melt... and whenever I wondered that, I prayed that it wouldn't be the case at all.