Chainsmoker [ Gaster!Sans x Reader ]

5. Before the Thunder

AyyyLexi Just for you ^^^^

(This chapter is dedicated as a flashback to one of [Y/N]'s pacifist timelines to get an idea of who they were and how much the genocide runs changed them)

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In all actuality, it had never been your fault.

Of course, you had been the one to take the knife and cut the monsters down one by one, driven only by your hell-bent reasoning that Chara had been the first push, the one to shove you into this.

But it had always been you.

Chara had been at the wrong place at the wrong time, just another corpse, another youth slaughtered in the name of freeing monsterkind. She wasn't a ghost or a spirit that had latched onto your soul, she was simply dead. Any other elaboration?

G e t o v e r i t.

At least, that was the phrase you had been telling yourself for the last few hours, freed from the cycle of the genocide run, freed from the murderous version of you that seemed like so much more of a nightmare than reality.

You had been a person once, a person who had never dreamed of picking up a knife for any other reason than to cut an apple. But as the resets progressed, as you lived the same damned life over and over and over again...

You snapped.

You weren't yourself, not really. [Y/N] would have never cut down Papyrus, watch as Toriel slowly bled to death in front of you. Insanity, that was what had driven you. Not Chara, not you.

You had been human once, you were sure of it.

"Isn't it beautiful kiddo?" Sans asked, staring at the rising sun. You smiled a bit, deja vu the pressing issue on your mind. You were sure that you had lived this life before, freed monserkind.

As Sans opened his mouth to say another line of dialogue, you interjected. "I hope that they have ketchup on the Surface," you said, your voice at a monotone level. Sans was completely taken aback.

"H-How did you k-know I was going to - "

"Say that?" you cocked your head to one side, trying to conceal the panic that had been threatening to spill over since the very moment you landed in the Ruins. "Sans, I've lived this all before... Freeing the monsters, making it to the Surface."

He stared at you for a moment, an empty gaze that you would become all-too-familiar with as the resets progressed. "I know," he murmured and turned away slightly.

You felt a rush of anger and immediately felt it dissipate. You had tried to reach out to the other monsters in the Underground, to see if they remembered the previous run as you had. But they had turned away from you, left you wondering just how off the edge you had gone.

Because wasn't it impossible to live the same day over and over again?

Sans had said nothing. He had told the same puns, the same jokes, not even a microscopic difference between him and the now three other versions of himself you had witnessed during the different timelines. "Why didn't you say anything?!" you spat, not bothering to hide the hatred you felt towards him. "I thought I was insane. I-I..."

"What did you want me to say?!" he growled, whipping around to face you. His left eye had turned into a startling blue, taking you by surprise. It was a side of him you had never seen before, leaving you to wonder just how much Sans was hiding. "It's never going to end..."

You wrapped your arms around him, resting your chin on his shoulder. He relaxed slightly, the argument forgotten. The two of you swayed slightly, admiring the rising sun. Would it really be that bad, to live the same life over and over? The two of you had each other, and that was good.

"Do you think this timeline will be any different?" Sans asked, not bothering to hide the hopefulness in his voice.

You blushed slightly, attempting to hide your face in the fur of his jacket. The last few timelines, the two of you had been close... closer than you had been with any of the others. Sure, Undyne, Toriel, Papyrus... they were all family to you. But you and Sans, the two of you had been more than that.

But the problem was, monsters didn't age. So even when you were seventy and lying on a hospital-bed, Toriel was leaning over you with a butterscotch pie, Papyrus offering moral support still clad in his infamous red armor and Sans... When you had been diagnosed with cancer, as you had been in every timeline, he had seemed to disappear. He would visit sometimes, offer a few words of encouragement, but it had been too much for him.

Too much for any of them.

So it seemed that the two of you could never really have a future outside of the occasional flirtation. Because what would he do other than watch as you slowly withered away, him remaining just as he had been decades ago? It wasn't fair.

It wasn't right.

"Maybe," you smiled softly, focusing your thoughts back to the present. There was worry though, the two of you felt it. Perhaps you could go on like this for hundreds of timelines, live life to its fullest.

But eventually it would become too much. Someone would snap.

I'm afraid, you thought and Sans picked up on this, holding onto you tighter. You relaxed slightly, leaning your head against his skull.

The monsters were your family, despite the prejudice thrown at them. There were the organizations hellbent on throwing them back into the Underground, coups that ended unsuccessfully. But things were good.

Your death, the resets, were a looming topic above the two of you, the talking point that was always avoided. And so when you were near the end of your life, the trademark chest pains signifying that the cancer had once more taken a fatal claim over your body, did you see Sans cry for the first time.

You had never known skeletons to be capable of such a thing, let alone a skeleton. "Hey," you gasped weakly, trailing a shaking finger on his hand. The heart monitors began to beep frantically, the final ode to your life. "Won't you smile?"

"Heh," he laughed weakly, forcing a grin on his face.

A low moan escaped your throat, your attempt to form your last goodbye.

"I didn't quite catch that..." he murmured, leaning closer to you.

But the only reply was the flatline of the heart monitor.

So you see it had never been your fault. You had been human once, a human with dreams just like any other. A human thrown into the machine of the Underground, forced to relive the same life over and over until the humanity simply left.

And maybe, just maybe, it could come back.