Disclaimer: I do not own Undertale.

"heya. is anyone there…? well, i'll just leave a message…"

Frisk stood in place like a statue. Everything was still, unmoving. The child held the phone loosely in their right hand, the receiver held a few inches away from the side of their head. Locks of long brown hair ran down their head, half-covering their tiny ears. They looked straight ahead as they listened absent-mindedly to the voice on the phone, their expression vacant.

Frisk recognised it to be the voice of their friend, Sans. The child felt a small hint of warmth inside their chest. It was good to hear their friend's voice again. Just listening to those familiar deep tones of the skeleton's voice brought some measure of comfort to Frisk's mind. However, no matter how hard Frisk tried, they couldn't make themselves speak. Every time they thought they were about to say something, the words would slip away. What was there to say? There was nothing that Frisk could possibly tell Sans that could make light of his situation – the situation of all monsterkind. They were trapped underground and left without a leader. There was no hope of escape for any of them, now.

Frisk couldn't fully understand what Sans was saying on the other end of the phone. The child focused on the sounds of his voice, but the words would not register. The skeleton was trying to tell them something – details about what'd become of the Underground since they'd left, that much they were able to gather – but they found it possible to discern the words themselves. There was no interference on the line and Sans' voice came through clear and distinct, but there was too much noise in the child's mind to pick up much more than a hint of what was being said. He might as well have been speaking to them over a broken radio for all the good it was doing. Silently, the child gave up on the hopeless effort, lowering the phone from their ear and letting their arm hang limp by their side.

'Where are they?' 'Did they manage to reach the surface?' 'How much time has passed since they arrived here?' These were questions Frisk felt they should be trying to answer, but they lacked the willpower to even try. Even trying to move their heavy limbs was too strenuous an effort for the child. They didn't even care where they'd ended up, showing no attempt to find their bearings in this unfamiliar place. They stood there, distant and empty. Their mind was one big blank – all thought obliterated in a nebulous mass of doubt, and guilt, and pain.

Only one thing was clear to them: wherever they were, it wasn't the Underground – meaning they had completed their goal. Against all the odds, they'd managed to escape from the kingdom of monsters, hidden deep inside Mt Ebott.

It was over. Their journey was finally at an end.

Or was it?

Frisk gave a sombre shake of their head. None of this seemed right. This wasn't what the child had anticipated at all. They'd expected, perhaps unreasonably, to feel some sense of accomplishment or achievement from their escape. At the very least they'd hoped things would go back to normal, somehow. But there was no satisfaction in having made it this far – no sense of triumph. All of that had been stolen away the moment the King of Monsters, Asgore, had died.

For a child as young as Frisk, it was difficult enough to comprehend death. Having seen someone die in front of their eyes, Frisk already knew it was something they'd never be able to forget. They hadn't known Asgore for long, really, but their battle had taught Frisk a great many things about the now-deceased King of Monsters. The troubled King was far from innocent: his crimes were terrible and his sins would continue to haunt him, were he still alive. But he hadn't deserved to die – that much was certain.

When they had first met, the King had given the child no chance but to fight for their life. Frisk had tried desperately to find some way to spare him, to prevent something terrible from happening. They'd gotten close – so close. But before they even knew it, he was gone. His life had been taken in an instant, snatched up by that villainous flower that Frisk had come to despise so deeply.

Now, the only image in Frisk's mind was the sight of Asgore fading away, his body reduced to dust. The image was burnt into their mind and would not let them rest.

In life, Asgore had been a mighty and beloved leader of his people – but he'd done more than simply lead. He wasn't just a King, but a father too. He'd been her husband, Frisk recalled. They'd had a child together. They were… a family.

Frisk shuffled on the spot uncomfortably, looking down at the tattered, long sleeves of their striped shirt. She probably still doesn't know what'd happened to Asgore, the child realised. He was dead, his soul shattered into a thousand pieces, and she didn't know. How would she react if she ever found out? What sort of things would she think?

Frisk looked away, their brow furrowed in dismay. The child wiped a few lingering tears from their eyes with the back of their shirt sleeve. None of this seemed right. It seemed so... unfair.

'Was there anything they could have done?' 'Could they have prevented the King's death?' These were the questions that occupied Frisk's thoughts – they circled relentlessly in the child's mind with a mocking sort of stubbornness. A voice in Frisk's head told them that there was nothing they could've done – that they were just a child, meddling in the affairs of a world they could barely understand, let alone have any influence over. A world they could not, and had never been, a part of.

The better part of Frisk wanted to dash those thoughts to pieces.

They looked back down at the phone. It'd gone dead, the dial tone beeped in an incessant, faint monotone. Sans was gone. Guess he got tired of speaking to no-one, the child reckoned. They could hardly blame him.

With a slow and deliberate movement, the child hung up and stashed the phone away in their pocket. As soon as they'd put the phone away, the air around them seemed to turn a touch colder. In that moment, a desperate loneliness enveloped the human child. Alone and lost, they couldn't help but regret their decision to leave. Why had they been so focused on escaping the Underground? Did they make a terrible mistake? They'd left their friends behind and now they were on their own here. There was surely no way to go back.

No way to go back…

Frisk looked up from the ground in an instant, eyes sharp and alert. They felt their pulse quicken as an idea suddenly entered their mind. The cloud of fears hanging over their head began to dissipate. Up until now, they had feared that there would be no way to reverse what'd transpired – that Asgore was gone forever and the monsters would be doomed to remain imprisoned within the mountain. But perhaps, with the help of their unique power, there would be a way to go back – a way to undo those tragic events and find a better outcome. A happy ending!

A cheeky little grin wiled its way on to Frisk's face. To think they'd almost convinced themselves that they were a normal child!

All the same, a heavy sense of trepidation weighed on the child's mind. They had never attempted a full reset before. Could it work? Would it really be possible to return to their very first save point? Would they be able to go that far back, even after all the damage and destruction that monstrous flower had caused? These thoughts remained for a fleeting moment, but were quickly washed away by a wave of child-like optimism. The more Frisk considered the possibility, the more excited they became – and the more the possibility seemed a certainty.

The child was instantly reinvigorated from their sombre state – ready to use their power to return to the Underground. Even if the effort proved too much for them, the very least they could do is try. With a new sense of purpose, Frisk was filled with determination.

Frisk thought of the monsters they'd met on their journey – all the friends they had made. The child's heart soared at the thought of seeing them all again, though they did their best to temper their enthusiasm as much as possible. As exciting as these thoughts were to Frisk, they couldn't allow themselves to become distracted from their new mission. There were two goals in the young child's mind: to undo what'd transpired in those final moments – and to see her again.

They might die if they didn't get to see Toriel again.

The child shut their eyes tight, focusing all of their energy into a wild effort. Slowly and deliberately, they reached deep inside their soul, searching for a single thread of power they might latch onto. They found it sooner than they expected – a long, ribbon-like thread of bright crimson. The child smiled inwardly. This had to be enough determination to send them back all the way. Without a moment's hesitation, they grasped a hold of that thread with everything had, drawing out the power from within…

Reset timeline?

Y/N