"So, why did you have to postpone last week?" Kurt asked. It was the end of November, and Sans and Kurt were back in the Underground. Sans was consulting his scanner, looking for a good place to set the machine back up.
"torii had invited us all up to hogwarts to visit the kiddos," Sans responded. "it was the first task of the triwizard as well, and alphys, undyne, and Papyrus all wanted to see the dragons. i'd have been the only person staying behind. couldn't do that."
"I'd forgotten the Triwizard was last weekend," Kurt admitted, wiping his brow. They were in Hotland this time around, and the region was appropriately named. They were within sight of 'The Core', the building that generated power for the underground. Kurt wasn't sure how, that was too much like Muggle technology. "How did that go, anyway? Hogwarts knock 'em dead?"
"krum and harry are tied, forty five points each," Sans said, his eyelights rotating around his eye sockets to peer at Kurt.
"Oh, right. I'd forgotten there was that mysterious second entrant. His name pops up a lot around the Prophesy division of the Department of Mysteries, as he was the boy who lived."
"the daily prophet doesn't think much about him," Sans said.
"Eh, I don't read it cover to cover," Kurt said. "Too much politics. Anyway, are we almost there? It's boiling down here."
"hm. we're close, i think," Sans said, consulting his device. "problem is, since we're going back in time, hotland will be pretty crowded," Sans thought about that for a moment. "was pretty crowded? well, whatever. got all the people who work at the mit resort, and all the people who work in the core. judging from last time, we won't land right on top of whatever we're looking for, so i'm thinking about where we should start."
That was an uncomfortable thought. Kurt had no real desire to get into a fight for his soul. It was one thing to investigate the past, but Kurt was more researcher than warrior. "How about the river?" he suggested. "Not right at the path, but a little beyond it, in the weeds, should give us a bit of privacy."
Sans looked over at the river, and contemplated it for a second. "huh. that's a good idea. we can hide the machine in some of the underbrush." So they did so. The earth near the river was muddy, and they went far enough away from the path that Kurt's shoes were rather coated by the end of it. After reassembling the delicate parts of the machine, and sitting down inside it, he used a warming spell to dry the mud and hit his shoes against each other to break most of it off.
To his bemusement and irritation, Sans, as far as he could tell, had no mud on his slippers. "How did you manage that?" Kurt asked. Sans just winked at him.
"oh, that reminds me," Sans said, he reached into a pocket, pulled out a slightly worn book, and handed to Kurt.
"The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy?" Kurt asked.
"yep. you should read that," Sans told him, his eyelights glinting. "there's some excellent theoretical physics ideas in that."
Kurt was pretty sure Sans was kidding, but it was hard to absolutely tell for sure. He put the book away and began to go over the machine's safety checks.
"so where are we going today, mister peabody," Sans asked nobody in particular.
"Don't you have your readings, Sans?" Kurt asked, "and who's Peabody?"
"for someone who works in time travel, you need more experience with fictional time travelers. how else can you set right what once went wrong?" Sans asked, his eyelights glowing with intensity.
"Mostly we don't interfere with time, that gets messy, and trust me. You do not want to cause a paradox. Time would try to eat you alive. We're trying to retrieve things... pieces... whatever its you're looking for that don't actually belong in the time we're going to."
"i know, i know. i was only kidding. still," Sans continued, "if i painted the machine blue and shaped it like a police call box..."
"No, even I know about Doctor Who," Kurt complained. "I still like Tom Baker the best. And if you're set, we're good to go."
"oh good. we're all programmed," Sans said, double checking the numbers. "and we're off." He pressed the engage button. The machine reacted much like it did the last time, rumbling to light, with the area fading to white, before black, and back again. "think we're here."
"Whenever this is," Kurt said as he climbed out. This time, though, he could tell he was somewhere (somewhen?) new. The lights in the distance were from the MIT resort, off in what he considered the present, could be seen, barely. He could see monsters on the path leading to Waterfall, and hurriedly pulled out his invisibility cloak, wrapping it around him.
"guess the barrier isn't broken yet in this time line. hm. could be a problem." Sans said, consulting the device. "the piece we're looking for, it's up. a lot up. i think it's in the hotland apartment area. so be sure not step on anyone's toes."
It was interesting, as he followed Sans up into Hotland proper. It felt like Kurt was observing a normal monster day, people were on their way home for lunch, stopping to talk to friends. There was even what appeared to be a very small dragon having a hot dog... though the small plane hovering a good deal overhead was somewhat disconcerting.
They got to one of the Hotland elevators, the left one, and crowded in. Kurt had to sneak in behind Sans.
"Heya Sansy," said one monster, looking almost through Kurt at Sans. He looked like a male duck, if all his feathers had been combed outward to give the impression of a snowflake. "You performing this week?"
Sans stuck his hands in his pockets. "maybe? got so many jobs i can't always keep them all straight, drakey."
"You should focus a bit better, Sansy," the Drake told him.
Sans shrugged, putting his palms upward. "eh, who else isn't going to do all the things i already don't do?" The drake rolled his eyes. Sans got out, which meant Kurt had to very carefully pick his way off the elevator. Disillusionment only went so far, but as they weren't expecting to see a human, they didn't.
They walked along the elevated walkway, towards a large open area. Kurt could see small entrances to what must have been apartments. But "What are these?" Kurt asked. "Steam vents?" It's what they looked like, grates on the ground. Each was next to a black, featureless, tile.
Sans stopped so abruptly that Kurt almost bumped into him. "the puzzle isn't active. that shouldn't be right."
"What are you talking about," Kurt asked. "Puzzle?"
"eh, something meant to stall intruders long enough that the royal guards could come see what's going. humans specifically, since we needed them to break the barrier. the souls, at least."
Dumbledore had told Kurt about the barrier and how it was broken, but that didn't make what Sans had just said any easier to decipher. "So the puzzle's not on, means they haven't found me yet, right?" he asked. That seemed like a good thing.
"yeah, i guess so," Sans said, he looked around at a few monsters hanging out in the 'plaza'. "i wonder. scanner says this way."
So, they went 'that way'. East, maybe? At the end of another elevator walkway, Kurt stopped in shock. It looked like some sort of guard booth; it had a desk, there was a chair behind it (littered with ketchup packets), but what stopped Kurt was the fact there was snow on the roof. Snow. Unmelting, cold looking, powdery, snow. In the middle of the heat. "How is that possible?"
"what? oh. i just moved it from snowden," Sans told him, moving closer. "and i'm kinda glad i'm not here right now. this is my guardpost." He looked back up at Kurt and winked. "is it a paradox if we're from different timelines?"
"Deep question, I'll propose it to my coworkers tomorrow. Wait... you just moved it from Snowden? But..." but Sans wasn't listening to Kurt's protest of physical impossibilities, he was digging through the drawers on the other side of the booth, and underneath various condiments, he found what he was looking for, and held it up for Kurt to see.
"Another bony disembodied hand," Kurt said. "Another piece of the old scientist?"
"the man who talks in hands still watches from outside," Sans said. It sounded like a quote. "i'm not surprised. from the readings, i'll bet there's two more. then i can use the readings from the four to find him."
"Well then, if we have what we came for, we can head for home," Kurt said. "Then we can work more on that scanner and try to pin down the next anomaly."
"it's just, you know? what's the date today?"
"The twenty-eighth of November," Kurt told the skeleton. "Oh, you mean 'now'. I certainly don't know."
Sans pulled out his phone, his bony fingers tapping in a quick rhythm. Kurt wondered if it was time he should get a smartphone, or any phone at all for that matter. Finding what he was looking for, Sans's eyelights dimmed slightly. "it's been two months. this can't be right."
"Two months since, wait, since Frisk should have fallen?" Kurt said, finally catching on to what Sans had been hinting at. "And the puzzles weren't activated, meaning she hasn't been seen. Does that mean she never came to the underground at all?"
"or that she never left torii's," Sans confirmed. "but for two months? she never said anything about being able to reset to before she fell. doesn't feel right, either. frisk was trying to figure out a way to save asriel. can't imagine being able to do that from within the ruins."
Sans dialed his phone, then pulled it up to his skull.
"Sans! You're calling me! You never call me!" Apparently, Kurt decided, some things stayed the same no matter which timeline you were in.
"hey, Papyrus," Sans said into the phone. "just got a quick question for you. you keeping watch for humans?"
"Of course I am, Sans! And... wait a minute! Does that mean you've found one?" Papyrus's voice was already loud enough that Kurt could hear him clearly from Sans's phone, but it may have even grown louder and more excited.
"afraid not, bro. just doing some research on something. thanks, though. see you later." Sans hung up. "hm. wonder if he'll tell the other me that i called him. might confuse myself. eh, it's going tibia okay in the long run."
"You're trying to be hard to be humerus," Kurt said. He'd looked some bone puns up, and had been saving that particular line for a special occasion, but Sans found it hilarious. Once he'd calmed down again, they made their way to the machine to return to their home time. "Look, you should just ask Frisk if she remembers this particular loop," he said, as Sans punched in the home coordinates.
"maybe," Sans said, his voice suggesting that his mind was elsewhere.
Sans was unusually quiet as they headed back to the machine. After they'd safely returned to their present, Kurt tried to rebreak the ice by asking, ""What can you tell me about the old scientist?"
"Dr. Gaster," Sans said, his eyelights flickering. "nobody else remembers this, so i'm not sure what i'm making up, and what really happened anymore.
"Try me," Kurt told him.
"Dr. Gaster was the head royal scientist. physics was his specialty, but after chara died, the king ordered him to perform research on souls. and he did, starting with the first soul collected. i'm not sure who that was, though i know the king knew. he was the one that extracted 'determination', and injected into what was flowey, waking up asriel."
"But that wasn't all he was working on, was it?" Kurt asked.
"no, about the same time he was preparing the 'vessel', as he called it, he began noticing things. he claimed he was seeing things he'd seen before, alphys and i thought it was just deja vu, but he was insistent. that's when he started his version of the machine. he wanted to research the anomalies. i thought at first he fell into the core, but maybe he got it close enough to working that something drastic happened. the day he vanished, alphys came into the lab thinking she was chief scientist, and always had been. i was the only one who remembered Dr. Gaster. not the king, not torii when i saw her again, not even Papyrus, no one else remembered him."
"Do you know why?" Kurt asked. "Was he close to you?"
Sans's eyelights flickered out. "don't know why. don't remember frisk's other loops, but i remember this." There was a particular edge to Sans's voice, and Kurt had the sudden impression that Sans was, if not lying, at least not telling the whole truth. Not about Frisk, anyway. But that wasn't important right now.
"But this Dr. Gaster," Kurt pressed, "he was close to you, wasn't he?"
Sans looked up at him, without the eyelights, it made for a scary view, and Kurt took a half step back before holding his ground. "Doctor Gaster is our father, and I will do whatever it takes to free him whatever fate holds him. That's the promise that I made."
"Sans," Kurt said, "I'm with you, every step of the way. I'm sure, wherever he's watching from, he's proud of you."
The skeleton's eyelights blinked back on. "thanks, pal. i mean that," Sans said, holding out his hand.
Kurt reached out to shake it... and the depressing sound of gas escaping a rubber cushion echoed through the corridors of the underground.
Now that the first task had ended, the conversation around Hogwarts had gone from the rivalry between Hufflepuff and Gryffindor, to the upcoming Yule Ball. This was not something Frisk was particularly interested in, as it was for fourth years and up. She, and the other two agreed, they'd rather go home for the holidays, so were most of their friends.
It was great to have Opal back with them, even if it did mean they were back to running laps before they they went outside for their customary Saturday flying practice. Then there was the discussion of what to get everyone's friends and family for Christmas. It was both easier and harder this year, while Chara and Asriel both had their unique insights of what to get the other monsters, now they had to work out a gift from each of them.
It was the Tuesday before the end of term, during breakfast, that a Ravenclaw prefect delivered a note to Asriel.
"What's that about?" Chara asked, between spoonfuls of cereal.
Asriel picked it up from the table, turned it over. "It's an invitation for the three of us to spend the afternoon with Professor Hagrid..."
"The care of magical creatures professor?" Frisk asked. "Why?"
"...along with another guest," Asriel continued. "One who's been wanting to meet you, again." He looked up. "Do you think it could be... what was his name? The centaur chief's son?"
"Dubran," Chara said. "I can't think of who else it might be."
"I guess we'll just have to find out this afternoon," Asriel said. "But we better get going, that's the five minute bell." They finished their breakfast quickly. "You know," Asriel said, pointing at the wall where the giant hourglasses kept track of the house points. "Were those always there?"
Frisk looked at where Asriel was pointing, and saw them. Above each of the hourglasses was a large shield in the colors of the house, in the center, the house's animal. A badger for Hufflepuff, a lion for Gryffindor, a snake for Slytherin, and a eagle for Ravenclaw. Those might have been there before, Frisk couldn't remember. The things that Frisk pretty sure were new were the three larger shields above them. There was one on the left, which was sky blue, and must have been a reference to Beauxbaton, the one on the center was Hogwarts, and the crimson one on the right had to be Durmstang.
"Think they mean anything?" Chara asked.
"Only that we're going to be late to class if if we stare at them any longer," Asriel said. "Come on, Chara. See you at lunch, Frisk!"
That afternoon, after putting their school things away, and getting their heavy cloaks, they gathered together in the courtyard just outside the entrance hall, and trooped across the grounds towards the care of magical creatures hut. They passed the giant horses that had pulled the Beauxbaton carriage, and knocked on the equally large door of Professor Hagrid.
It was first answered by the bark of Fang, then by Hagrid opening the door. His gaze fell down on Frisk first, who smiled hopefully up at him. "Ach, yeh came. Come in, come in!" And, all though the space in the hut was normally quite large, it was being taken up by two centaurs. Firenze and Dubran.
"I told you they would come," Firenzie said in his quiet voice, smiling across the table at the three Dreemurrs. "Young Dubran has been asking, almost since you left, if we could try to arrange a visit to Hogwarts to see you."
Frisk felt uncomfortable. There was no way that the chief had approved this visit, she met Chara's eyes, and thought her sister was thinking the same thing. But Asriel was excited. "It's good to see you!"
Dubran's eyes were shining. "And you, how have you been?"
Hagrid passed around cups of steaming tea, and they sipped it as they talked. "Now then," Firenzie said after a few minutes. "You said you had something to show them?"
"Oh! Right!" Dubran exclaimed. "I brought some bows, in case you wanted to learn to shoot some more. They're even smaller ones, so it should be easier."
Before Frisk could decline, Asriel and Chara had eagerly accepted. What was it about bows, anyway? Undyne had bought her a toy bow last Christmas, and now they had a centaur wanting to teach them the real thing.
After being taken just inside the Forbidden Forest, away from any prying eyes, and after Hagrid made a rather loud and thorough search of the nearby area, Firenze unpacked and strung a a few bows, and allowed Dubran to start showing the others how to shoot. Asriel threw himself into it, and Dubran helped him set his feat, line himself up with the target, and aim. After watching them, Frisk had to admit it took a certain agility, and strength, to fire a bow. She had the first, not so much the second.
Chara had the best results, she managed to hit the outer edge of the tree hung target. Asriel was close, but Frisk just didn't quite have the knack for it, and left each arrow short of its target. "That's okay," Frisk said. "It's not really my thing, anyway. But it's been fun to see you."
"It's getting late, we do need to be back before dinner," Firenzie told them.
"Can we do this again?' Dubran asked.
"Yeh certainly have my permission," Hagrid said, grinning down at them.
"Yes!" exclaimed Asriel and Dubran together. They shook on it, and Dubran let Firenzie take him back towards their home.
"Hagrid?" Frisk asked, as the two of them passed out of sight. "Are they going to get in trouble if Chief Magorian figures out where they've been? Does the headmaster know they were coming?"
"Yeh, he does, and he approved of it," Hagrid said. "Great man, Dumbledore, said it was important for Centaurs, Humans, Monsters, everyone to get together. As for Magorian, that's fer Firenze to worry about, not you lot. But don't go spreading it around the castle. There's been that Prophet lady sticking her nose into everything, and I don't want to know what she'd write about."
They thanked Hagrid for the tea, and headed back up to the castle, jumping as an explosion went off from an enclosure on the other side.
"Eh," said Hagrid, rolling his eyes. "Don't mind the Skrewts."
A/N: Hey folks! As always, I just want to thank everyone for the reviews, favorites, and follows. They're extremely gratifying to me, as a writer. As always, don't just tell me what I'm doing right, tell me what I'm doing wrong too. I reread these things three times at least before I post, and I'll miss things on the tenth time, as well. If you don't want to leave a review, consider a Private Message, I'll read and respond, I promise.
See you soon!
