gaster blaster master caster disaster

[voidster]

Out by the edge, near sunset, someone is doing Something Very Stupid. It isn't the first time. One can only hope it will be the last.

It's not the worst thing he could be doing. He's 99% sure it won't kill him--it's only magic. He's successfully regained some skill with bone attacks and extra sets of hands, so why has this been so difficult? He misses them, even though they're really nothing more than echoes of his own personality, not creatures of their own right. He created them. He perfected them. He's proud of them.

To anyone watching, he doesn't look like he's doing anything. Standing stiff and still, hands clasped behind his back, watching the sun go down. Until something nearly as tall as he is explodes into being, floating in midair.

And then...

He starts to melt. He's overreached, he doesn't have the energy to keep his shape together. Legs sag and fuse, fingers drip like pudding, face loses all detail. Two minutes later, he's nothing more than a sad, mostly shapeless whiteblack lump of goo in the dirt. The Blaster skull nudges at him, like a huge curious nightmarish puppy.

Worth it.

Comments

[trombones]

"Uh-oh."

Sans snorts.

"Okay. Yeah. I can imagine, with Tori. Asgore not so much, but. She still does that."

[voidster]

[Well, working as a pair--I was outnumbered and outweighed.]

He's a little more expressive now, only half melted in the face. This is a bittersweet sort of fondness. Asgore and Toriel are very much fine, but won't remember him. Can't. Even if he does see them again. Even if he's right about them being close at all, somewhere, somewhen.

[He kept it up even after--] A vague handwave, his way of letting a sentence trail off. [We stayed friends. I... think. I knew him longer than I knew her.]

[trombones]

"Figuratively and literally."

Sans chuckles. The joke is that they're skeletons...????? At least, Sans still is. They're light and easy to picks up. Especially when Toriel just feels like it.

"I can get that. You must've been around for 'im."

[voidster]

Chances are both Toriel and Asgore could still haul him around like a sack of popatoes. They could most monsters, through.

[I suppose I was.] Sad that it didn't matter in the end--things turned out the same even without him there. [He saw you and Papyrus sometimes when you were younger--do you remember that?]

[trombones]

"Kind of."

He has to think about it for a moment.

"Only because it was a long time ago, though. That stuff's pretty easy to remember. But yeah, I remember old fluffybuns."

[voidster]

He's a little taller, a little thinner. Still lacking shoulders, hips, or legs. It'll come sooner or later. Maybe one of those little cakes will speed things up. He reaches for it with a third hand by instinct, the same old purple floating sort as always. It doesn't make him collapse back into a puddle, so that's good.

[A good babysitter. We could use him here.]

[trombones]

"Heh. Probably. We got a lot of Frisks running around who'd be happy to see 'em."

But he's stating the obvious. Sans rolls back and looks up at Gaster.

"Last time I saw him though, he was pretty happy where he is. Tori opened up a school, and he takes care of the garden. So. He doesn't need to be here."

[voidster]

A fourth hand breaks off a bit of cake, the tiniest little bite, for him to nibble at. He's still not sure he can actually gain energy from eating. Needs more testing.

[Knowing him, he wouldn't mind being here for a little while. Or perhaps I can't think of the castle as a bad place to be. I... don't know.]

Hold on there. Hesitantly, [You do know that A-S-R-I-E-L and C-H-A-R-A are here, too...?]

[trombones]

"It's not the worse place you can be, but. I'm saying not everybody needs to get dragged away from home and everyone they know, you know?"

Kind of like how Sans himself had almost been here for a year now.

Whatever. He shakes his head.

"Yep. Never knew them before here, but I put together than Asriel was their kid. Yeah."

[voidster]

Hell. Sans already knows if Gaster could send him home, it would have been done already. Him, and all the others who don't seem to belong here.

[You do have a point.] No desire to apologize for his own opinions. That's as close as he can come--that, and dropping the subject. [It would be far better for them to find a way home. Or for someone to find it for them. I've... made no progress.]

[trombones]

A shrug. Sans sticks a pink where an ear would be if he had one.

"Don't worry about it. I've been here for a while now. This place is better than nothing at all for some people anyway, like the other Sans. I still wouldn't wish this place on anybody who doesn't need it. Like Asgore or Toriel or Papyrus."

Even if he missed the hell out of them.

[voidster]

Same. Those three... Sans will see them again. He never will. How disgustingly selfish he is, in some ways. It never seems to get any easier.

[You'll return eventually, like you never left. It'll all be fine. ...in the meantime, if it helps, I am glad we had the opportunity to meet again. I missed you.]

Selfish.

[trombones]

Sans goes quiet for a moment. He got the hint, Gast. He got it a while ago. It's not like he wasn't thinking about it either.

"Who knows."

He gives one more one-armed shrug. At this point, he really didn't know if he was going back. Most of him wanted to doubt it. Everyone else, even his other self, told him otherwise. That's not what he wanted to address, though.

"... And I know. I missed you too. A lot."

[voidster]

[I said that before, didn't I?] He... does that. What a crowded mind he has, full of too much stuff. He was a little absent-minded before, though. A nerdy stereotype.

Now there's enough facial detail to show that he's smiling, in that teasing way, [It's worth saying more than once. I want it to sink in, if it can get past your thick skull.]

[trombones]

Pfft.

Okay. Sans laughs a little at that.

"I got it from you. But you know what? Fair."

[voidster]

He's nibbling a little more cake and gliding around on his gooey base to watch the sunset a bit more closely.

[You both got it from me. Perhaps you should start smacking me with newspaper whenever I don't listen.]

wrap this one up soon? can't think of much else

[trombones]

"Eh."

Sans shrugs.

"Ask Papyrus. He already does it to me."

sure~ sob I'm sorry. (one day Sans will get a squishy hug, I want to do that.)

[voidster]

Oh! Brighter, brighter, yet brighter.

[You've run into the new arrival, I take it? The one who chose to be a scientist instead of a future Royal Guard?]

you're fine, I'm just can't think of any good replies/ideas. Gaster can hug him anyway.

[trombones]

Sans lifts his head up and decides to sit up.

"Yeah."

He scratches the back of his head.

"It's different. Heh. But yeah. It's good to see him again, one way or another."

<3

[voidster]

A hand pats him on the shoulder, as usual, not attached to anything.

[Different, yet still the same Papyrus at the core. He's always the same.]

[trombones]

The skeleton blinks and looks up. He's quiet for a moment. Then he shakes his head, his smile quirking up just a little.

"Yeah. He always is. I'm used to it now, but... we haven't had any kind of Papyrus around in a long time."

One more time, he looks off, towards the edge.

"Like I said, I don't want him here, but..."

He doesn't finish. It goes without saying that he missed his brother anyway.

"Heh."

[voidster]

[I'm not concerned.] Pat, pat. He's drifted a little closer, mulling something over. Scraping up courage. [He'll be alright. You know him. He's unshakable. Immediately, he was thinking of puzzles and research and new friends. And probably sharing spaghetti with us.]

[trombones]

"I know. But if he was happy back home, I'm hopin' he gets to go back soon."

But they already talked about that, and it probably goes without saying. He shrugs, still looking up at the sky.

"Heh. Man, How long's it been since I've had his spaghetti?"

[voidster]

[Wasn't it a year? I believe that's what you said. ...I won't give up, I will find a way to allow us all to choose to go or stay. I promise.] The hand flutters, then comes to a rest on the back of Sans's jacket. As long as Sans keeps hinting, he'll keep promising. Reassuring. [I wonder. How long has it been since I had his spaghetti?]

He... genuinely doesn't know. How long since he vanished, all traces of even the accident erased?

[trombones]

"Yeah. Almost a year now."

At the touch, Sans blinks again and looks up. First to the hand, then to the rest of Gaster. He stays quiet again for a long moment - until he smiles.

"... Thanks, Dad."