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Entry 15: Frisk
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The last of the echoing footsteps from Gaster and Sans disappeared down the hallway and the silence grew, ringing in their ears, making their breathing and heartbeat seem too loud. Last time it had been easy to be alone here but now, now anxiety crawled under their skin and made their chest feel too tight.
They snatched the change of clothes from the bag Gaster had brought and rushed to the shower room to shower and change. They reluctantly headed back to the break room, knowing Gaster wouldn't be back for a while.
A wave of warm air made them pause and take a step back, looking into the server room. The room was dark except for the blinking lights from the server towers. Frisk tapped a knock on the door as they pushed it open and stepped inside.
They looked for a light switch near the door but hesitated to flip it. Gob was still inside, eyes closed. Frisk knocked on the door again, a little louder this time.
Gob opened one eye that slowly swiveled back to focus on them.
Frisk shivered, "S-sorry, I just- It's just..."
Gob slowly blinked at them and slowly turned back towards the inner room.
"...I should go..." Frisk said hesitantly, clinging to the doorknob to pull it closed.
A larger, older computer monitor sitting on the ground near Gob flickered on. The screen stayed black even as it hissed with static.
A green line of text wrote across the top. 'Hello. Please come in.'
Frisk let go of the door and took a few steps inside until they were standing next to Gob, looking down at the monitor, "Is that you?" They asked glancing at the Gob.
Gob nodded slowly, their eyes shutting again like they were resting. The screen said, 'It's good to have a chance to talk to you properly.'
"Yeah." Frisk said softly, dropping down to sit on the floor in front of the monitor, "You talk a lot... faster this way."
'Yes. My magic allows me to interface with computers and communicate a lot more efficiently than with my body. Trying to talk physically is like-'
The cursor paused briefly and Frisk patiently waited for Gob to continue.
'-trying to run in water. Everything is slower and more difficult. I suspect my difficulties come from my parents being so vastly different from one another. One of my parents was a moldsmall.'
"And your other parent?" Frisk asked.
'A humanoid, she resembles what humans think of as a demon. It was a strange relationship but they loved each other.'
Frisk blinked, brow furrowing as they tried to contemplate the strange couple. Then they frowned as they remembered, "But moldsmalls, they don't live very long right?" They clapped their hand over their mouth, "sorry..."
'It's fine. You are correct, Burble, my moldsmall parent, fell a long, long time ago when I was still very young. I have only one or two very vague memories of them. I was fortunate that my soul strength took after my mother and I have lived as long as I have.'
"How old are you?" Frisk asked anxiously.
Gob's body rumbled with a sort of chuckle, 'Twenty-six. Dr. Gaster took regular readings of my soul in the first three years I worked for him. He says that at the rate of my soul magic is decaying I should expect to live to about forty-five.'
"That's not very long," Frisk said faintly.
Gob chuckled again, 'Perhaps not for you but it is far longer than I thought I would live.'
Frisk bit their lip and nodded.
'Have you been doing well here at the lab?' Gob asked.
Frisk shrugged then realized Gob wasn't looking and said, "It's been ok. Kinda weird... sometimes scary..."
'Has everyone gone home?'
"Yeah." Frisk said, squeezing their legs, "Mr. Gaster said he would come back but he hasn't yet."
'You may stay here as long as you want to and visit whenever you wish.' Gob said, 'I enjoy the company.'
"Thank you!" Frisk jumped to their feet, "I'm gonna get some pillows and I'll be right back, ok?"
They hardly saw Gob's response before they ran back out to the lounge, filling their arms with pillows and dragging a comforter behind them back into the warm server room.
"I'm back." They said a little breathlessly. They left the door open a few inches and arranged the comforter and pillows on the floor and laying down, chin propped up to look at the monitor.
'Are you comfortable now?' Gob asked.
"Yes!" Frisk said feeling much calmer inside the small room. "Sans said you are in charge of the servers?"
'Yes. I run the servers for the underground and maintain and write all the programs. Right now I am repairing some of the damage caused by the explosion. There was a surge of power and quite a few servers crashed. I am restoring what I can, and recovering data.'
Frisk glanced around at all the different server towers gently humming and warm with power, "Don't you have surge protectors?"
Gob laughed faintly, 'Yes. But the surge was quite a bit stronger than they were designed to handle. I do wish that Dr. Gaster would not risk himself so carelessly.'
"Mr. Gaster is strange," Frisk said.
'Dr. Gaster has been very good to me. He is a good monster.' Gob opened an eye and peered down at them.
Frisk wiggled into the blankets nervously and Gob slowly closed their eye again.
Vivid green script began to flow across the screen, 'When I was young they thought I wasn't smart because I was so slow. The school wouldn't take me because I would require so much extra help to succeed in any way. My mother managed to obtain a repaired computer from the dump. I learned a lot just from examining the programming and she did what she could to obtain more programs and information for me. Eventually, she went to Dr. Gaster because he was in charge of the Underground's servers. He could have easily turned her away-'
Frisk nodded absently.
'But instead, he invited me and my mother here and allowed me to interact with the computers they had at that time. He said I had great potential and took me on as an intern and student that day. That was eighteen years ago.'
"Wow," Frisk said faintly. They stared at the monitor and then looked up at Gob, "Tell me more stories?" They asked.
'I think I can do that' Gob smiled.
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Entry 16: Gaster
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Gaster stepped off the lab elevator with a sigh. Papyrus had taken longer than normal to get to bed and then Sans had wheedled all sorts of promises out of him, to rest and not push himself and to keep his cellphone close at hand.
His footsteps echoed down the shadowed hallway and he reached up and rubbed his face, pressing his fingertips along his eye sockets and the jagged cracks in his skull, taking a deep breath at the prickle of pain that cleared the fog of exhaustion from his head, at least for a little while.
He stopped a few steps into the lounge. It was empty and at least one bed had been stripped of blanket and pillow, a few other beds were also missing their pillows. Gaster walked more slowly, glancing around to make sure he didn't miss anything. He peered into the lab and then headed up to the hallway. He heard a sound coming from the server room and walked a little faster, peering into the room.
Frisk was laying on the ground next to Gob, watching Gob's monitor. "What did Jack do?" Frisk asked with anticipation.
The screen was too far for Gaster to read. He watched a little longer, seeing Frisk's head sink further into the pillows, their voice turning into a faint murmur as their eyes fought sleep.
Gaster nodded to himself and returned to the lounge, heading straight for the coffee pot. He set the machine to making a pot of the darkest coffee he could stand and went to the lab while it brewed. Gaster pulled open the mirrored storage cabinets one after another, touching nothing, running his eyes over the contents, one shelf at a time. In the third cabinet, on the bottom shelf, he found what he was looking for; a spare matter sampling gun still sealed in its plastic bag. He took it out and slipped it into his pocket.
Back in the lounge, he took the full pot of coffee back with him to his office. He filled the cup on his desk, sitting down with a sigh and hating how comfortable the chair was. He tore the sample gun from its plastic and leaned over, pulling up a pant leg and applying the gun to his leg. He let out a hiss of pain as he pulled the trigger. He hadn't been prepared for how much more it would hurt without topical numbing. Gaster let his pant leg fall back over the sore little circle and grimaced at the discomfort of the fabric rubbing faintly with his every movement.
He leaned back into the chair and put the sample gun in one of his desk drawers, dropping a file on top of it to hide it from the sight of a casual observer. Gaster agreed with Koshka, that taking too much of his matter might destabilize him but he also knew if he fell asleep he would anyway. It was a race against time. He traced the circles cut out of his palms. He had let Jack take the Excisior apart once Papyrus had been born but he could make it again if he had to.
He grabbed his large notebook and flipped to the page in the back, writing in wingdings which only Sans would be able to read, and checked his calculations. The amount of matter he would have to remove. In possibly only a few days at the rate his exhaustion was proceeding.
Gaster picked up his coffee and quickly drank half the cup, wincing at the heat. He put the mug down and got to his feet, opening the second drawer of his filing cabinet and leafing through the files until he found the original blueprints for the Excisor and sat down with them.
He wasn't sure he had the time to redesign it to allow him to remove matter from a rounded surface. He could make it bigger though. The only surface he had that was flat enough for the machine would be his torso. He suppressed the faint shudder at the idea and pushed it from his mind as an unnecessary distraction.
Gaster picked up his pen and began working on the calculations.
The coffee in the pot dwindled. Gaster blinked wearily for all that the coffee made him faintly jittery. He shifted his legs under the desk to rub his ankles together and winced at the bloom of pain, taking a deep breath and trying to steady his thoughts.
He refilled his cup with the last of the now cold coffee. As he was setting the pot down and reaching for the mug he thought he heard a faint voice. It was low and masculine and though he couldn't make out clearly, he knew without a doubt that it was not a voice belonging to anyone who worked the lab.
Gaster startled to his feet with a surge of adrenaline and hurried out the door, his ear straining towards the voice. He looked into the server room briefly and was relieved to see Frisk still inside, sleeping beside Gob. He pulled the door shut quietly and walked to the lounge.
"Doctor? Are you here?"
It was Asgore. Annoyance mixed with faint fear in his gut. Gaster took a second to smooth his rumpled clothes and put a pleasant smile on his face, then stepped into the room.
Asgore was slowly walking through the lines of bed and paused when he spotted Gaster, "Good morning, my friend. I was hoping to discuss your current project." His words were friendly but held hidden tension.
Gaster covered the distance to stand before the king, noting with some mild concern that he was wearing his full armor. "How can I be of assistance, your highness?"
Asgore frowned deeply when he saw Gaster and looked him over critically, "...I spoke with Principal Huefer. He said you seemed to be hurt and it seems I was right to be concerned. What has happened to you Aster?"
Gaster sighed inwardly, "There was an unexpected explosion during testing."
"I was under the impression your current project was not dangerous," Asgore said, a warning tone in his voice.
Gaster smiled brightly to mask his growing tension, "It was no more dangerous than any other machine, I can assure you. It simply overloaded and there was a minor explosion. It was just an unfortunate accident."
"Doctor." Asgore sighed, reaching his hand out and squeezing Gaster's upper arm briefly, "Are you alright?"
Gaster nodded, "Of course. The only true injury I sustained are the cracks in my skull," he reached up and tapped the lower one, "My eye can no longer fully open but it is undamaged. It is only a minor hindrance."
"And the rest?" Asgore said with only the slightest hint of annoyance, gesturing with his other hand to Gaster.
"Ah." Gaster said faintly, "I believe the surge of power during the explosion caused my matter to destabilize briefly. I am quite solid now." He spread his hands in front of himself before clasping them together. "It was odd at first but at least I no longer have to worry about my joints getting caught in things."
Asgore laughed politely at that before the somber expression returned to his face. "You worry me, Aster," he shook his head, "I had hoped, removing your access to the souls might confine your work to safer avenues."
Gaster stiffened and with some effort, kept the venom from his voice, "Yes, well," he said shortly, clearing his throat. "The D.T. extractor was disabled and all work on fallen monsters was halted, as you ordered."
"It was for the best," Asgore said with that infuriatingly gentle voice and squeezed his shoulder as if that was supposed to comfort Gaster. He continued, "In light of this explosion-"
Gaster narrowed his eyes.
"-I believe it may be best if you report to me on your projects every other week, rather than quarterly." He sighed, "I do not doubt your genius, Aster. Your work has benefited all of monsterkind greatly and will no doubt continue to do so. I worry, however, about your lack of self-control."
Gaster bristled, "Nonsense, I am perfectly able to-"
"Now, now, Doctor." Asgore said soothingly, "I have no wish to anger you but your safety and the others in your employ is too important. If you press me," he said warningly, "I will be forced to employ an inspector to check on the progress of your projects personally and regularly."
Gaster stilled his anger and managed a chilly, "I understand, sire."
Asgore nodded, "I must get back. Will hopefully have time to speak with at greater length in the future."
Gaster bowed his head stiffly.
He turned to leave and then hesitated, half turning back, "Take care with your commutes between here and New Home... I have reason to believe a human may have fallen into the Underground."
All of Gaster's anger was instantly replaced by curiosity, "Have there been sightings?"
Asgore hesitated again, "Not as such. It is just a feeling but it has not been proven wrong before and I have no reason to doubt it now. Warn your assistants as well."
"Yes, sire." Gaster said mildly as he watched the king leave.
He had wondered if Asgore might be able to sense the time loop. The king's body tolerated more Determination than the average monster because of the strength of his boss monster soul and his levels were unusually high, high enough that he was able to manifest it into a trident.
The king's statement had other interesting implications. If he had felt time loops before, then possibly the other humans had also been able to effect the timeline. The chances that all the humans who came through the Underground had exceptionally powerful souls seemed unlikely. So either the barrier attracted powerful souls only allowed the powerful through, or the encapsulating nature of the barrier, which kept the levels of magic in the atmosphere abnormally high, was somehow enhancing their abilities.
So many interesting possibilities.
Gaster returned to his office for the coffee pot and made a fresh pot and washed out his cup as he thought. It would still be a while before Koshka arrived, she was usually the first in.
Gaster filled his cup with coffee and walked back to the server room, pushing the door open and knocking on it with the back of his knuckles.
Frisk lifted their head and twisted around to look at him, "Mr. Gaster?" They asked softly, but not sleepily. Tension hunched their shoulders as they sat up.
"I would like to speak with you, Frisk." He said, "If you would be so kind as to join me in my office."
Frisk nodded and slowly stood, gathering the comforter they had slept on around their shoulders and following him back to his office.
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(Next Update: November 10, 2016
Bit of a cliffhanger, those are always fun. Next entry is 17 too, gotta love an entry 17, this one won't be hidden in the game files though. See ya'll next week and thank you so much for reading and all the comments. Sorry, I still haven't replied to anything, my mental health is kinda not healthy right now. Also probably a lot of typos and mistakes for the same reason.)