The Time Before (Undertale)

47 ~ Helping Sans

The night was difficult for Gaster.

Eventually, once Sans had fallen asleep, he sent Papyrus back to bed, with the assurance that Sans was okay now.

Several times after that, he tried to tuck Sans back into bed, and go back to sleep on the couch. But every time, he got no farther than a hand on the doorknob before Sans would let out a pitiful whine, already back in the depths of a nightmare, and Gaster couldn't help but feel like he was only making things worse (if Sans' nightmares were about Gaster dying, then Gaster certainly wasn't helping by leaving him in real life. Sans would subconsciously pick up on the disappearance of Gaster's Magic, and, well... that would only aid his imagination.)

So, of course, Gaster always immediately turned around, walked back to sit on the side of Sans' bed, reaching out to scoop Sans back up into his arms.

Only for the process to repeat itself, four or five times.

Eventually, Gaster just gave up. He flopped over on Sans' bed, letting Sans snuggle up to him.

~o0o~

When Gaster woke up the next morning, it was to Sans poking him in the ribs.

"... Ow. Hey. Good morning."

Sans gave him a kinda funny look. "why are you in my bed?"

Gaster sat up, yawning. "'Cuz you wouldn't let me leave."

"what?"

"Don't you remember? You had a pretty bad nightmare last night."

"yeah, i remember, but i woulda thought you'd have gone back to bed."

Gaster shrugged. "I was going to, but every time I started to leave, you started whimpering. I assumed you were having more nightmares, and, well..."

Sans blinked a little. "... oh. sorry."

"No. You don't have to apologize." Gaster shook his head. "It's not your fault. You can't exactly control nightmares. And you can't expect to have no repercussions after something like-..." Gaster cut himself off when he saw Sans shudder. So he got up, out of bed, and stretched, cracking his back. "Anyway. Breakfast?" He stretched out a hand to Sans.

Sans took it. "... yeah. okay."

Gaster led Sans down the hallway, down the stairs, and into the kitchen. Not long after, Papyrus came in to find Gaster cooking pancakes-- or, trying to, rather. His cooking skill had improved dramatically in the last few years, but that wasn't saying he was a good cook.

"You two are up early." Papyrus grinned at them. "Normally, I would have to wake you up!"

"yeah," Sans chuckled, "dings woke me up. he fell asleep last night in my room, then woke me up when he rolled over on top of me!"

"Dad!" Papyrus admonished.

"It wasn't my fault!" Gaster said, a mostly burnt pancake sticking out of his mouth. "I was asleep! I can't really control what I'm doing then!"

Sans snorted. "i thought you were the royal scientist, and there's nothing you can't do."

Gaster gestured. "But I'm not the Royal Scientist then, I'm asleep!"

Sans gestured dismissively. "excuses, excuses."

The morning continued on until each of them headed off for the day- Papyrus to school, and Sans and Gaster to Waterfall to work on the folding machine. It had taken Sans some work, but he had managed to convince Gaster that he was okay, and not so totally traumatized by the event as to be unable to work on the machine.