No One is Happy with This (Undertale)

39 ~ Mistakes

Over the last few hours, you've noticed something about Gaster. You had him pegged for an excited, enthusiastic, involved person, but the more festive your family's Christmas celebration becomes, the more he draws back to watch from the sidelines. And he looks perfectly content to do so, leaning against the windowsill, a mug of hot chocolate in hand.

A few hours ago, Alphys and Undyne showed up. After them came Asgore (Toriel was still mad at him, but for the most part, they got along alright.) Monster Kid had arrived soon after, and Mettaton and Napstablook would be coming later that night (they had already planned to do a Christmas pageant somewhere, and would be coming after.)

With the group assembled, the gift exchange commenced. Just as with Santa, no one had really gotten anything for Gaster. You overhear him saying, though, that it's more than enough to just be in space and time, with his sons again.

And you can see, with him sitting on the sidelines, he really does look happy. And every now and then, Sans breaks away from the group and stays near Gaster for a little while. Sans looks happy, too. Happier than you've ever seen him.

Eventually, dinnertime comes around. There's piles and piles of food, more than enough for everyone. In that moment, you are ridiculously happy that monster food never goes bad, because you're gonna be having leftovers for the next month and it's gonna be amazing.

During dinner, while you're all seated together, Gaster makes a request- he wants to know everything that he's missed. And, according to Sans, it was just a few months before the sixth human Soul was collected that Gaster was erased.

So Sans starts off with the story, telling how he tried to build the machine in his basement, but couldn't. You're not surprised when, since he's sitting on Gaster's left, Sans gets an arm wrapped around his shoulder, Gaster pulling him close.

From there, everyone else picks up the story, Toriel telling how she found you in the Ruins, and you describing how you made it through the Ruins, to where Papyrus carries on, telling how you and he had a great time with puzzles and japes. Undyne talks after that, describing her hunt for you, and how she eventually saw you sparing the monster kid, then saving your life. And Alphys describes meeting you in the lab, and admits to having Mettaton attack you so she could save you.

You talk about how you met Asgore, fought Asgore, fought Flowey, then reset in order to find a better ending, then reset again and again and again until you got it.

Until you went True Pacifist and found the True Lab.

Gaster asks about the Amalgamates. He assures Alphys that it's purely out of scientific interest, but you can tell she still feels guilty about it.

She makes an offhand remark about how it was her worst mistake, and she doubted Gaster had ever done anything that bad.

And Gaster just bursts out laughing. It's a loud, full laugh, with his skull thrown back and his chest out. Like he thinks something is genuinely funny. Absolutely hilarious.

"Alphys, you've got nothing to be ashamed of. I have done things a thousand times worse than that, and kept going just fine."

"R-really?" Alphys asks. You can see she's curious. You all are. "W-what-...?"

Gaster gets a faintly amused look, and seems to think back for a moment. "Weeeeeell, I could tell you about all the things I did in the human and monster war, all the weapons I made, all the blood on my hands, but that was a war; it's not surprising that I was violent, especially considering I-" he hesitates for just a moment, then continues "I saw my own brother murdered in front of me. So I won't tell you about all the horrible, awful, violent things I did then.