W. D. Gaster - An Undertale Story

Chapter Thirty-Five

Gaster opened his eyes in the regular morning of the Underground. Little did he, or anyone else, know how irregular the day following would be. Gaster threw the soft bed covers off of him and let his feet fall to the floor. He threw on a dark pair of work clothes along with a white lab coat. He called down Sans into the living room. He made sure that Papyrus had gotten to school, Sans assuring his father that the young skeleton had. Gaster walked to the Lab with Sans, the two talking about normal things such as their work, stuff going on at home, the usual.
When the two arrived to the Lab, they headed down to the bottom floor, the True Lab. They found Alphys, talking about the Determination and the flower.
"So, what's the plan for today?", Sans asked as he put blueprints for other projects up. Gaster focused his attention to Sans and gave a small smile.
"Well, I was thinking about adjusting a few things on the CORE.", Gaster began. Sans waved one of his hands in a circular pattern, signaling for Gaster to continue. "You could do some work on the amount of power produced from the CORE, Sans. Up it a bit. And Alphys, you can adjust a few things on the temperature deeper in the CORE, can't you?"
Alphys gave a nod while Sans showed a thumbs-up. Gaster smiled and nodded. "Good.", he said, pleased. He then walked through the dark lab area to the elevator, his two assistants following behind him. He continued his routine of going from the bottom floor to one of the upper floors. Alphys and Sans went over the instructions on how to operate the CORE, Gaster giving tips every once in a while.
The three monsters then walked from the Lab to the CORE, to its areas in the Hotlands. Gaster had a blueprint-map that showed where each area in the CORE was and how to get to it. Sans nodded ever so often as he looked at the demonstration. He decided that he had no need for the map and could find his way around. Alphys, on the other hand, decided, with Gaster's permission, to take the map with her, just to make sure she wouldn't get lost. As Sans went one way while Alphys went the other, Gaster decided to go with Sans. He wanted to help his son with the certain thing he was doing, no matter how advanced Sans was.
Sans and Gaster followed into an elevator in the CORE, Gaster pressing the button that would take them to the correct floor.
"So, what made you want to update the power on the CORE?", Sans asked, head tilted to the side.
"You see, I feel that people might need a bit more power and electricity here in the Underground. It's one of the many things that can help monsters in these times that we're underground. I just hope to see when we get to the surface.", Gaster explained.
Sans nodded in understanding. The elevator then stopped, as it had delivered the two skeletons to their destination. Sans immediately walked out, Gaster quickly following, attempting to get ahead. He walked with Sans, looking around for the main power module. He made a sound of triumph as he saw it in his sights. Sand and Gaster walked over to the power module. It was a dark orange-brown color, just like the rest of the CORE. It had several buttons on it, all of which were a majority of colors. Sans stood in amazement.
Gaster pointed to a range of buttons. There were two specific ones he was pointing at. One was a bright green button in the shape of an arrow pointing up with a white positive sign on it. The other was below that button. It was a bright red button in the shape of an arrow pointing down with a white negative sign on it.
"You see those?", Gaster asked as he looked at Sans. Sans nodded in response. "Those are what control the power that the CORE produces. The positive button makes the amount of power increase, producing two times more power with each click. The negative button does the same, except it just decreases the power."
Sans rose his hand to the buttons but began to hesitate. He looked at his father with a raised non-existent eyebrow. "Uhm, how many times should I click the positive button, Doctor?"
Gaster sighed a bit at the fact that Sans had called him doctor. It wasn't that it angered him, or that he didn't like the respect. He just found it weird for his son to call him so.
"I'd say... give it about four clicks.", Gaster said, answering Sans's previously asked question.
Sans clicked the button four times, just as he had been told to do. Suddenly, the elevator door let out a loud ding as the doors opened. Alphys walked out of the elevator, making her way towards Sans and Gaster. "I finished fixing the temperature!", she said with a large amount of enthusiasm. Sans chuckled a bit. Gaster smiled softly.
Gaster then rushed over to a certain part of the CORE, in the room, that had a small opened space that the entirety of the Hotlands was visible from. He looked over the Hotlands, trying to see if the job Sans did had done what it was supposed to do. Gaster smiled as a seemingly "light show" appeared in front of his eyesockets.
Many of the homes in the Hotlands began to shine a bit brighter. Not bright enough that it would hurt, but bright enough that monsters would be capable of seeing much better in the dark Underground. The restaurants that usually had only one or two dim lights now had brighter lights. Gaster let an extremely happy smile spread across his skull. His idea had really worked. His crazy idea had truly worked. All with the help of his two assistants, his two best friends.
Gaster turned to Sans and Alphys. He suddenly felt uneasy as he stepped down from the open space, but he figured that it was just the way he landed. Sans and Alphys looked at Gaster with smiles. "Look,", Gaster began, "I just want to say that I must be the luckiest Royal Scientist in the world. And the luckiest father. Because I have you. Alphys, my loyal assistant that feels like a sister. Sans, my extremely smart son, capable of doing anything. And if Papyrus weren't at school but rather here, I'd say that he's one of the strongest and greatest skeletons to exist. And I'm lucky to have all of you. You all are, always have been, and always will be the greatest people I know."
Sans and Alphys smiled happily, unimaginably happily. The two couldn't suddenly respond to Gaster's sudden fatherly moment. His sudden respectful moment.
But the moment ended too soon.
Gaster felt the pain hit him when it happened. He knew it wasn't physical pain. It was too strong to be physical pain. No, this was emotional pain. Gaster felt the air as the floor fell out from under him. It seemed that the floor where he was standing wasn't stable, and Gaster standing in that area for too long had caused it to break and collapse under him. So he, along with the piece of flooring, began to fall into the CORE.
The moment may have been fast, but to Gaster, it felt like an eternity. He saw the pain in Sans and Alphys's eyes as they saw him fall. He heard the shouts as the went after him. He saw them slowly disappear from his sight as they looked into the hole he had fell through. Sans let out a blood-curdling scream as he reached his hand out. But Gaster was far too deep within the hole to even attempt reaching for Sans. Sans wanted so badly to jump into the CORE, but Alphys held him back with extreme force. She wasn't going to lose two people.
It pained Gaster to watch it happen as he fell into a pool, a bottomless pit of darkness. He was so scared, so terrified that he couldn't even let out a scream. He couldn't cry. He couldn't do anything. He was simply frozen with fright.
The only thing moving Gaster was the rushing air as he fell. Then everything was dark. Nothing moved. There was no air. No wind. Gaster could hear nothing except for the sound of himself breathing. Am I dead?, Gaster wondered to himself, but immediately dismissed the idea. No, if I was dead, I wouldn't be breathing.
Gaster began to see a bright light. He began to wonder if instead he was about to die. But no. One bright light became two, two became five, five became seven. Bright lights surrounded him, came closer and closer. Gaster was speechless. Words wouldn't escape his mouth, as he had nothing to say.
He was speechless not only because he was somewhere between alive and dead. But he was also speechless because he knew exactly where he was. The lights, they were screens. Like television screens, each showing something different. One showed Sans with Papyrus. Another showed Alphys hanging out with Undyne. Except for the screens, everything was darkness. This was the Void. Gaster wasn't alive, nor was he dead. He wasn't caught in between worlds, he was outside them. He was outside of time and space, in the place Dr. Raven had mentioned in her letter. The Void.

So here I am.

Trapped.

Outside of time and space.

Forced to see timeline after timeline.

I can't exactly affect them.

I can't make contact with them.

No one seemed to remember me.

No one remembers me, that Royal Scientist with two sons.

No one remembers me.

The one.

The only.

W. D. Gaster.