#stage 3!killer

[theartsynebulawhodoodles]

greetings

Killer belongs to Rahafwabas, dividers from creators who labeled it reblog/like/free to use.

[somethingnewarchive]

Here’s where everything Killer Sans and Undertale:Something New is archived. There’s the tags to try and find things of course, which might be out of order and misplaced (especially if the tags aren’t working), but in the meantime here’s a masterpost and here’s a Google Doc not made by me.

[howlsofbloodhounds]

I’m not an expert on characters like Murder and Horror, so those who are who happen to come upon this can correct me if I’m wrong, but I’ll try my best to answer.

For Killer, the answer is a very big yes. In his comics, Killer thinks to himself things like how he can’t be Sans, because Sans wouldn’t kill Papyrus—and this is one of the reasons why he knows he’s “different.” In asks, it’s revealed that Killer doesn’t think he has earned the right to be called Sans again or to ever change his name from Killer. He talks about how he wants to change in his Good Ending—how he wants to be Sans again, and begs Color to help him with doing that.

(To which Color seems to think the way to do that is to somehow fix Killer’s soul—suggesting that the way Killer’s soul was unwillingly changed without his consent had a major effect on Killer’s sense of identity and perception on himself. On top of that, his code—like in a video game, meta sense—was altered from his normal coding to “k1ll_sans,” and we see that code seems to be tied to, potentially “active,” depending on what state (Stage) his soul is in.)

On top of that, there’s the whole “two personalities” thing. A lot of debates in the fandom on what exactly this is supposed to be or represent, but most seem to agree that it is dissociative in nature—so the idea of this character, Sans, having developed a dissociative disorder due to the events of this timeline (Something New timeline) isn’t too far fetched.

According to Google, “Dissociative disorders are mental health conditions that involve a loss of connection between thoughts, memories, feelings, identity, behavior, and surroundings. They can involve involuntary escape from reality and are often linked to breakdowns in memory, awareness, identity, or perception.”

So yes, Killer does not consider himself Sans—or at least, not the Sans he was, and he seems to consider himself different from both alternate timeline Sanses and especially from alternate universe Sanses. This whole identity has a very big hold on his day to day life—Nightmare can use it to override his choices, perceptions, thoughts and emotions. Killer relies internally on these two “personalities” on making his own choices.

He seems to experience black outs and loss of control of his own body when encountering something that triggers his soul into Stage 4 (or when something triggers a flashback that winds up triggering that Stage).

He talks about himself in Stage 3 in a very removed, detached way—not as if it’s a different person entirely, but in a way that suggests that he either doesn’t have control over himself when in Stage 3, or that he doesn’t see any issues with anything he does when in Stage 3 or why he shouldn’t do it or not want to do it because it makes sense to him when he’s “like that.”

He talks about himself when in Stage 2 in a very similar—only with less emphasis on “immediately kill me” and more on “don’t trust me when I’m like that. Ever.”

For Horror, it’s to my understanding that he doesn’t really have any reason or need to consider himself not Sans—Horrortale doesn’t seem to dive much into AU stuff canonically. I do know he seems to have some type of amnesia and/or memory issues, as well as seemingly a bit of a personality change—but that seems to be due to both his skull injury, his current situation and environment, and the trauma of his attempted murder and betrayal of his two friends.

But his identity and sense of self seems to be mostly intact—he is Sans, even if he may or may not remember long stretches of his life before the events of Horrortale.

As for Murder, he also seems to have an intact identity and sense of self—he is Sans—but just different, thanks to time, trauma and stress, as well as his own actions and choices driven by his own desperation. I remember reading somewhere that he just doesn’t like who he was before.

As for Delta and Color, this one’s a little tricky, as not only has that type of stuff not been very picked into in their canons (and Delta has very little), but they also absorbed human souls—souls that belonged to entirely separate, developing beings with their own personalities, senses of selves, experiences and memories, and therefore likely their own motivations, desires, narrative and interpretations of events, goals, dreams, and voices.

I know Gaster still calls Color by “Sans” in the canon Othertale material—but like Horror, it’s not actually canon that Color ever leaves his universe and starts meeting and interacting with other alternate universe characters, besides his encounter with Core Frisk in the Void. He’s also aware of alternate timelines, but not alternate universes.

Not to mention—Color (or Sans) would’ve realistically spent about two decades of his life completely trapped in the Void and isolated from the rest of the world, both physically but also in their own memories.

The person he was doesn’t even exist or matter to anyone else in Othertale. This is bound to cause some identity issues, on top of the dissociating and daydreaming that the trauma and stress and just loss of everything he knows is bound to have—already with the six human souls layered on top like a fucked up identity cake.

We know that superyoumna has said that the souls is not like “multiple personalities,” but adding traits on top of Sans (possibly in a way that makes Color), and we have seen a few drawings of that in action—“you’re filled with Kindness”—and although nothing obviously changed other than the color of Color’s flames and eyelight, it does seem have an almost possessive effect on Color and his behaviors when that happens.

To the point that he’d disregard others boundaries and others saying no in an attempt to be kind, almost in the way a friendly but excited child would—like, for example, very tightly and very suddenly hugging Cross even as Cross struggles, attempts to push Color off, tells him to get off, and calls him a freak.

For Delta, we do see the Bravery soul and Sans communicating—with Bravery encouraging and picking Sans up when his grief and depression stops him from wanting to keep fighting anymore. Gives me the idea that Delta is almost like a fusion from Steven Universe.

So i don’t think it’d be a stretch to potray Delta and Color with some various presentations of plurality/multiplicity, although it is not due to trauma or a dissociative disorder, even if the characters also have trauma (and will show signs of CPTSD and/or PTSD, with the possibility of the souls themselves also having their own memory, traumas, triggers, and flashbacks) and may experience dissociation and identity alteration, identity confusion, switching, co-con, blurred sense of self, fusion, passive influence, and/or just a sense of “becoming” different or someone else. It’d be very rooted in the elements of the fictional universe—magic, supernatural, souls.

[stellocchia]

A little headcanon I have about Killer's stages is that each of them has a different relationship with touch.

Stage 1 is touch starved as all Hell and is desperate for any positive interaction. However, he also struggles with it, both because every time someone approaches him, even if it's a friend, he has to fight the expectation of harm, and also because he's afraid the closeness may trigger one of the higher Stages (and he's then scared that they're the ones who are gonna go down the violent path).

There is nothing he wants more and less than a hug.

He probably has to introduce touch very slowly even once he's with Color. Start with fingers brushing against each other, leaning shoulder to shoulder, a head path here and there. Things like that.

Stage 2 feels rather detached from their body. They're overall rather indifferent to touch. Likely only paying attention to it when it hurts (that's why sometimes they find themselves craving the pain, it helps them stay grounded. It is not, in this case, a healthy coping mechanism. Stage 2 refuses to set proper boundaries and take care of their needs. It is not a priority for them. And they're hella self-destructive).

They tend to allow touch if they can gain something from it (be it a feeling of control from trying to suppress their trauma responses to certain types of touch, or tying someone to them).

If anyone ever doubted that they need a therapist, well, they do.

Stage 3 is pretty much a cat. As long as you play by its rules, you're both gonna be happy. If you do anything it doesn't approve of, you're getting bit. Hard. Stage 3 to me is mostly nonverbal (it often is unable to speak because of the condition of its soul and the panic needed to trigger the switch. It is not a choice for it not to speak, it genuinely cannot) so the bite is all the communication whoever is brave enough to cuddle it is gonna get that they did something wrong.

That said, one is mostly safe as long as they avoid the chest area (where the soul usually rests), the face (with the teeth so close, the temptation to bite just because it can is too strong to resist), and any fresh injuries.

It is not easy to gain enough of its trust to even get it to allow you close enough though. It doesn't matter how much Stage 3 may recognize that it needs support and closeness to keep the body healthy, its priority is fighting off the danger always. But Color and, in time, the rest of Chromatic Crew probably manage it.

Stage 4 is, without a doubt, the most compliant. At least toward whoever it identifies as its master, although if whoever that is orders it to stay still and let someone else touch it, it would. Stage 4 is, above all else, obedient. It likely does not even know if it likes touch or not, nor if it wants it or not. Not because it's in any way stupid, just because it doesn't see itself as a person, but as a tool. And tools don't have preferences, so why let itself wonder about such pointless things?

Any attempt at establishing its personhood is gonna be met with extreme resistance and likely also panic if it comes from its master-figure. The desire to obey them would end up in conflict with the orders of everyone that came before and if the two are too conflicting, Stage 4 is always gonna default to following Chara's orders as they were the one who molded it.

While Stage 2's issues could be helped by therapy, I don't know if that's the case for Stage 4. It would probably be better if Color just learned to work around them or with them to still give it a better life than before without its fight or flight instincts too much.

[ask-codeearasure]

I always seem to think the best while I'm at work or it's 3 in the fucking morning.

Killer but he wants a new name and the Stages but they want their own names too. Probably wouldn't happen but there's always a slim chance they'd explore the notion far into the future of love and safety and where they learn to cut themselves some slack.

They probably would still collectively go by Killer, but have a list of names and nicknames along with it, like K, Kay, Kat, Strawberry, Krill, something related to a comfort of his or just a name he happens to like or finds funny.

But each Stage separately might still subscribe to the numbers pattern of names, particularly Stage 2 because that's my favorite motherfucker right now. Maybe he just likes being called Two in many languages, Dos being his most favorite.

Stage 3 I don't think would care about the names thing, but surprisingly Stage 4 is receptive to words in morse code in which it can communicate nonverbally and while it doesn't assign itself a name preference, perhaps it ends every message with a particular pattern or signal. It could be a vague sign it likes the look of or maybe a tune or specific sound.

Stage 1 would be the most indecisive of if they even want a name change or just another name seeing as they carry the bulk of the guilt for their past and have to fight themself to stop looking for punishments, death, or isolation. But if I look through this with the angelkin!Killer lens, perhaps he'd like something with a theme related to that (can't think of specific examples) or maybe a gemstone like Onyx or Ruby (playing off of dragonkin!Color's attachment to shiny priceless things)

-- Sarco

[theartsynebulawhodoodles]

ｓｏｍｅｔｈｉｎｇ ｎｅｗ

{Something New AU Art-no ship}

Closeups 𓏲𝄢

Something new belongs to Rahafwabas, dividers either sister Lucifer or other creators who labeled it as reblog/like/free to use

[theartsynebulawhodoodles]

𝔞 𝔯𝔬𝔰𝔢 𝔰𝔬𝔲𝔩

[Killer Sans Art]

killer sans belongs to Rahafwabas

Dividers from sister lucifer or were 42u

[howlsofbloodhounds]

Because I wasted 2 hours of my life last night yapping about this in the comments section of a YouTube gacha react video, I’ll bring my nonsense over here too.

It is never stated that Nightmare knows about Stage 4, or its existence. It’s just shown that he knows he can change and use Killer’s SOUL to control him. It’s a lot more likely that Nightmare only knows about Stage 1, 2, and 3.

This is because:

1. Killer doesn’t even tell Color (at this point, the only one he feels he can trust enough to ask for help from and share this information with) this very important information, and he doesn’t tell him out of what seems to be guilt, shame, fear, and self disgust.

Chara asks if it’s because he’s ashamed of them, and of what they and Killer did together—although Chara refers to him as “Sans,” if I recall correctly. Killer doesn’t answer, but he avoids looking them in the eye and tells them to just go away and leave him alone.

Killer in Stage 1 would rather hide this very important information that could be a threat to Color’s life and safety down the line because he’s ashamed.

So I don’t see why he’d ever tell Nightmare about Stage 4 willingly, especially when that information can be used against him to further control him—considering Stage 4 seems to cause full blackouts and a complete loss of control over his body.

2. Killer hides why he returns from missions with stolen souls sometimes, from Nightmare.

Now we as the audience know that he steals and bargains for others’ souls because he claims that each SOUL has its own unique code and he wants to study them. However, even when answering questions from us, he’s dodgy about his reasons and motives.

We can reasonably assume that he is studying others’ codes because he wants to understand his own code and attempt to fix it. Yet Killer in Stage 2 doesn’t even tell Nightmare why he has a SOUL at all—just tells him not to worry about it.

Another thing: people over on YouTube want to give Nightmare morally grey reasons for why he fucks with Killer’s SOUL against his will, even if it means making things up and treating it as if its explicitly canon. Or perhaps thinking something is canon to Killer when it isn’t explicitly shown or confirmed, or they mix up Joku’s Killer with Rahaf’s Killer.

This includes making up the idea that Nightmare knows about Stage 4, and that Nightmare controls Killer’s SOUL to prevent it from going into Stage 4. Which “helps” Killer.

This is not true. It’s not shown or even confirmed that Nightmare knows about Stage 4 at all—and Nightmare does not exercise his control over Killer’s SOUL for any intentions other than to control him. Even if he attempts to lie about it, and manipulate Killer into believing he is helping.

It’s a lot more accurate to say that Nightmare controls Killer’s SOUL to keep him manageable and obedient.

He forces his SOUL into Stage 2 because he knows Killer would not willingly work for him or do his dirty work if he were to go into Stage 1.

He doesn’t want Killer to try and leave, he doesn’t want Killer to try and change either.

He doesn’t want Killer or Color to try and fix Killer’s SOUL, which is something he says himself when he forces Killer back into Stage 2. And this is likely the reason why Killer hides his motives for taking others’ SOULs from Nightmare.

Nightmare likely only knows about Stage 3 and attempts to force Killer back into Stage 2 whenever he’s in Stage 3 not because he genuinely wants to “help” Killer in his own way—even if Killer may or may not believe that it’s helping in its own way—but because Killer in Stage 3 is wildly uncontrollable, angry, and highly disobedient. I would even say disorganized.

Killer in Stage 3 doesn’t make for a good, useful weapon.

On top of that: if Nightmare were genuinely controlling Killer’s SOUL to prevent Stage 4, then in the Stage 4 comic, it wouldn’t have been stated by Chara that Stage 4 is actually getting worse, not better. Killer only ever gets worse working for Nightmare, not better.

The only way I can see Undertale: Something New Nightmare doing something that can be argued as helping Killer even a little is that he doesn’t want Killer to kill people.

The reason given is that Nightmare can’t get negativity from dead people, although that can be debated as the emotions living people feel after deaths and murders can definitely count as negativity, but that’s one reason. And Killer has been shown to be willing to obey it, although, as we see when he’s triggered into Stage 4, those orders go out the window.

Also, the idea that Nightmare is “helping Killer but in a negative way” because Killer “doesn’t want to feel emotions” and Nightmare “takes” his emotions away is actually based on Joku’s version and interpretation of Killer, I’m pretty sure. Not Rahaf’s.

Rahaf’s depiction of Killer is different from Joku’s interpretation of Killer, and it’s likely the Nightmare is Dreamtale and the Nightmare is Undertale: Something New is different in some ways as well.

So, as always, if people wanna say Nightmare knows about Stage 4 and is helping Killer by somehow controlling his SOUL to prevent it, then they can do that. If he’s genuinely helping or genuinely wanting to help, or if he’s just using that idea to manipulate and control Killer further. But it’s not explicitly shown, or confirmed, in what we have left of Killer’s official material by Rahafwabas.