Sans didn't allow himself to sleep. He instead decided to spend the entire night reading over his notes—keeping the screen as dim as possible for the slumbering kid's sake. It seemed that despite past Sans' interest in Gaster, he unfortunately didn't figure out much. All he really had were some old files detailing Gaster's activities and research just before death and what Sans had already explained to Frisk—the magic magnetism that Gaster's ghost(?) seemed to have. The files he found were vague and full of holes, but they were all that could be found. Sans didn't have Gaster's files saved anywhere on the Constant, but the notes detailed where they could be found in the Royal Archives.

Sans, in the last run, mentioned adding some code to the program that collected data form Alphys' sensors to automatically detect and alert him via text when and where Gaster (or some other weird magical anomaly) made an appearance. The skeleton checked his messages—nope, no Gaster alarm so far. But Alphys didn't have a way to get sensors in the ruins, so Sans couldn't be sure whether Gaster had been there or not. In the past run, the Gaster alarm had gone off a couple of times (always near where Frisk happened to be), but Sans always seemed to arrive too late to catch him.

As for the kid—they were perfectly merciful, which was common in recent iterations. Sans, Papyrus, and many other friends helped Frisk defeat that evil flower thing and open the doors to the surface. This outcome had happened a few times before. The first time they found the surface, he naively believed it meant he was free from the endless restarts. What a fool. Something always happened, the kid always started it over within the first year of reaching the surface. Sans never really knew why.

For some reason, the last run didn't end the same way. It went on for years and years. As the notes continued on, they became less like documentation and more like some kind of diary. Sans read thoughts he didn't recall ever thinking that resonated deep within him. Thoughts about the kid, about the murders, about being trapped in this endless looping so long. He read about his fears that it was all dream he'd wake up from, or worse, that he was still stuck in the loop (which, of course, turned out to be sadly true). He wrote about waking up every day and wondering if it would be his last day before it all started over again.

He also wrote about his relationships, how friends became family. He even became close to Frisk, but admitted to his private notes that he would probably never feel safe around them. The present Sans had to agree on that as he glanced over at the child—even asleep, they made him nervous. Sans was surprised to read that he moved in with Frisk and Toriel after a couple of years. Past Sans seemed to write a lot about Toriel; he wrote about her jokes, her fears, her passions, her bad habits. He wrote about her pain, too. Pain from losing her entire family at once. From living in solitude for so long. From all the human children lost. He never wrote it explicitly, but Sans had fallen in love with her.

Papyrus, when he wasn't doing important mascot work, made a living in therapy. He wasn't certified or anything, but kind of like a therapy dog, he travelled to hospitals, nursing homes, hospices, prisons, and all other places where people suffered. Sans wrote how much he admired this—Papyrus dedicated himself to going to people and easing their emotional burdens, giving away his overflowing love and support to those who needed it. He wrote about his worries that his brother was overextending himself—the taller skeleton often came home drained and unhappy. He seemed to sleep longer, too. Sans wrote about trying to talk to him, trying to convince him to take a vacation. Papyrus has responded that if others didn't have the luxury to escape from their problems, he shouldn't either. There were no mentions of a resolution to this problem, which deeply concerned both the past and present Sans. He decided if they made it to the surface again, he would address this problem early on. Find some way to push Papyrus into a more selfish line of work.

Sans had written in detail about monsters and humans—their strange and distant relationship. There were a few acts of violence committed against monsters. Notably, Mettaton himself dealt with bomb scares at many of his concerts. Apparently, there were humans who couldn't stomach seeing a single monster become so famous. What was strange was that monsters were so, so massively outnumbered by humans; at most there were maybe a few thousand monsters while the global human population reached billions. Even a monster that had consumed human souls would be no match against many human weapons—terrible things so powerful they could eviscerate entire cities within seconds. Sans could barely believe what he read about the humans, the insanity that they had achieved. How could they feel so threatened by monsters when they themselves were destroying the world so efficiently on their own?

Sans also had written a lot about the physical parts of the surface. Wide open spaces, blankets of stars, mountains and valleys that overwhelmed him. The Earth was the size of a hundred billion Undergrounds. He couldn't comprehend the size of the oceans, even when he saw them with his own eyes. Sans could begin to see how there were so many humans and so little monsters, considering how much space each group had to spread out.

Of course, there were other reasons for population differences as well. Monsters can live a very, very long time. King Dreemur held his royal title since even before monsters were driven into Mt. Ebbot by the humans. The death of a monster is considered just rare enough to be well discussed, even by those the monster never met. Because of their long lifespans, monsters didn't really have children very often at all. The children they did have could afford to grow up slowly. Meanwhile, humans (who usually didn't even get to live a century) could over the years have as many as twenty children if they really wanted to. Children weren't born at such a high rate in all countries—wealth and environment seems to play a big part in birthrates—but there were many places where overpopulation was a serious concern. Too many humans led to famine, disease, oppression, and general unhappiness. Additionally, violence was so disturbingly common, the humans even invented the word 'genocide' (a word that made Sans shiver) as a way describe the deliberate killing of most or all of a population of people. Sans reflected that as terrible as things were for monsters, their problems were relatively small compared to the suffering many humans seemed to face. Of course, Sans was quick to point out in his writing, that didn't invalidate the monsters' suffering—it just shows that misery is inescapable in the presence of humanity.

Sans had written about much more—all the details of his friends and the directions their lives took (interestingly, Frisk ended up having several children but never married). Sans saw that the night was coming to an end and soon the kid would wake up. He rushed through the notes and finally approached the end. This is what he read:

"dec 8. the kiddo isn't a kid anymore. the last few years, they've been dealing with all sorts of health problems. especially in their brain. they can't even remember our names sometimes. sometimes they think they're back in the underground again. what hell must it be like to think you're still trapped in that fucking loop? is it worse when it's real or when it's in your head? they started having panic attacks again. their own broken brain triggers them. worried they're gonna hurt themselves.

dec 13. toriel put the kid into hospice care a couple days ago. humans and monsters alike have been visiting them in a steady stream since, except for when the staff kicks them out. there isn't enough room for all the flowers people send. by law, no monsters are allowed to be near frisk when they die because humans are so scared a monster will take a soul. only the kid's human family and friends are permitted when that time comes. toriel's a mess and i don't blame her. she's watching one of her own children die all over again. papyrus is the only one who seems at ease in this stupid hospice. he's holding the rest of us together.

dec 15. i'm scared, honestly. what is going to happen when the kid dies? will it all start over again? are we still in the loop? after all this time, i never told a monster about the loop. i tried talking to frisk about it, they're the only one who knows. but they weren't waking up and the nurse kicked me out. visiting hours are over i guess. i can't sleep. i remember how it was too vividly. all the old nightmares have come back. i don't want frisk to die. but they will. all i can do is hope they stay dead. please, please, let the loop be over.

dec 16. thought i saw a familiar face when i visited the kid today. glimpsed him through the half open door, but when i entered he vanished. funny thing is, i just can't quite remember who it was as i'm writing this. whoever it was really scared me. docs are saying the kid doesn't have much longer. the crowd of humans and monsters gathered outside the building is massive. mettaton said the whole world is already mourning. only frisk's kids and grandkids are allowed in the room. probably only a few hours now. god i'm scared."

And there, the notes ended. Sans' expression darkened. He had a guess at who he had seen in that room He had two hypotheses: either Gaster caused the reset, or the reset was going to happen anyway and he was there for something else. Neither one sounded good. Sans rubbed his skull, suddenly noticing the headache he had. Well, that's what happens when you stare at a tiny screen for hours instead of sleeping. He heard shuffling coming over from the bed, the kid must be waking up. The skeleton wondered if he should tell them about their own death later.

"Sans?" Came a pathetically small voice from under the race car blanket.

"yeah buddy? what's up?"

There were a few moments of silence. "Nothing. Just a nightmare."

Sans decided he wouldn't tell them.