The moment they stepped out of the RUINS, the cold hit them almost instantly. It was a blast of freezing air, and falling snow, although this was another thing that Wander didn't understand. How was it snowing inside of the mountain? "Hey, uh, Wander? Does your hat have anything for us? We could really use some coats or something, haven't been this cold in a while…" Sylvia asked, and Wander shrugged.

"You know as well as I do that my hat doesn't give us what we want. It gives us…" Wander began, but his friend cut him off.

"Gives us what we need. I know Wander, just tell it that we need something to keep us warm." Sylvia huffed, but not before noticing what appeared to a large broken branch sitting in the path. "Now what?" Sylvia asked herself, but Wander hadn't noticed, he was too busy digging around in his hat. He let out a quick squeal as he yanked out a pair of sweaters.

"Might not be much, but it's better than nothin' at all!" Wander shouted, quickly pulling his sweater down over himself. "Here's yours Sylvia." Wander Handed off the sweater and began to wait patiently for his friend to put it on, until he noticed something in the distance. It appeared to be a run-down stand with a sign placed on the front. Wander approached and read the sign aloud. "Hot Dogs…?" Behind the stand were several bottles of ketchup, mustard, and relish… They were all frozen solid. Wander scratched his head as he read the smaller text placed on the sign. "Relocated to HOTLANDS… That's a shame… A hot dog sounds pretty good right about now…" Wander muttered, and heard Sylvia call him.

"Wander! You need to stay focused, we need to find this SNOWDIN town, and then if we head straight through we can make it to WATERFALL. Then we'll be one step closer to home." Sylvia said, lifting her friend onto her back, before setting off again.

Along the path they traveled they past many similar stands, including one that was poorly made, one surrounded by burnt dog treats, two that were side by side, one that had its floor covered in raisins, and a tiny dog house. Not too long after that they saw the large sign that read "Welcome to SNOWDIN!" In bright, colorful letters. Wander smiled, until he saw the actual state of the town, the buildings were falling apart, and bits of roof tiles, shattered windows and various other objects littered the ground.

"Geez… What happened here?" Sylvia asked, until she noticed that Wander had once again left her back, and was darting from place to place with a worried expression.

"I'm awful sorry if I'm annoyin' yah right now, Sylvia… I just have this feeling in my gut that somethin' ain't right here. I just want to see if we can find someone to talk to, to find out what happened here…" Wander said, and although she didn't want to admit it, she had the same feeling. It was deep in her stomach, like someone had dropped a large stone right in.

"All right, Wander… We'll look for a little bit, then we've got to get moving again…" Sylvia muttered, part of her not wanting to know what had happened, but still… She knew that there had to be someone around. Their search led them around the small town, until they reached the last house. It was decent sized, covered in colorful lights, with a green wreath on the door. Sylvia moved forward and tried to turn the door handle, only to find it locked. Sylvia sighed and began to say "Look Wander, we've searched the entire town, and there's not a single person, monster, not even an animal around! Maybe we should just give up and go to WATERFALL…" Then, almost as if on cue, they heard the door creak open.

"What the? Who the hell are you two?" A voice asked, and standing in the door way was a skeleton. He was short, with a blue hoodie, a pair of black shorts, blue, untied, sneakers, and finally a long red scarf tied around his neck.

"Finally! I knew that we'd find someone!" Wander shouted, rushing towards the skeleton, who took a startled step backwards.

"Whoa! Stay back! I'm not afraid to defend myself!" The skeleton shouted, and Wander slowed to a stop.

Wander's smile returned as he realized that the skeleton must think they're some kind of villains, they would just have to prove him wrong. "Defend yourself? From us? Aw, you don't need to do that! We aren't gonna hurt you. In fact we want to do the complete opposite!"

"Opposite? So you're here to heal me?" He asked, and Wander shook his head.

"No silly! We're here to help you! After all, looks like your home here, is falling apart… Just like that house, and that house, and that house, and that house, and that house, and tha-"

"Look, I don't need any help, after all… I don't really have a reason to repaint, or to clean the gutters anymore… No more neighbors… I mean, th-that's great for a lazy guy like me… Right?" He said, trying his best to give a warm smile, seeing that Wander was not a threat.

Wander however was able to see through the skeleton's fake smile, he could see the pain and sadness in his eyes… Eye sockets. "You doin' all right? I've never seen somebody fake a smile that big before…" Wander began to approach, and the skeleton took another step back, he grabbed onto the frame of his door, and began to sweat, much to the confusion of the duo.

"H-How much do you know?" The skeleton asked, which left Wander and Sylvia even more confused.

"Know? Look, we don't have time for this right now, so if you really don't need any help, then don't waste our time with riddles and junk like that…" Sylvia said.

"How much do you know about… What happened here? Why the place is in ruins like this…?" He asked, and Wander felt the sinking feeling in his belly return.

"Close to nothing. We were told that the monsters here were nocturnal. So we wouldn't see many of them." Wander replied, and the skeleton's grip on the door frame tightened.

The skeleton sighed, and looked at Wander's big, caring eyes. "Yep… Nocturnal… Heh… I'm Sans… And you two are?"

"Well, I am Wander, and this is my trusty steed, and my very bestest friend, Sylvia!" Wander nearly shouted, and Sans grinned.

"You two are pretty close, huh? Almost reminds me of…" Sans began, but suddenly stopped, he took on a sad expression, before noticing that the duo was staring. "Oh, uh, did you two need something else or…?" Sans asked, and Wander shook his head.

"Well, to be honest… Now I'm kind of curious… You asked us if we knew what had happened… I thought you were gonna tell us… So… What exactly did happen here?" Wander said, and he saw the tiny white lights that were Sans' eyes disappear as a large frown appeared on his face.

"Everyone's just been sleeping for a very, very long time… Don't worry, they do this every year… So they'll be waking up soon. Need anything else, or can I go about my daily business?" His eyes returned and he gave a nervous smile.

"Well, we get to WATERFALL by taking this pathway… Right?" Sylvia asked, pointing down the only large path. "Or were we supposed to make a turn somewhere back there?" She jabbed a thumb in the direction of the RUINS.

"Nope, just take that path and you should be good… Well, I don't know what you're looking for… But good luck…" Sans backed up into his house and shut the door, while Wander and Sylvia left. Sans leaned on the door and slowly slid down onto the ground.

"WkA dsWj'Q YJeP ShAz hSP kIne?" (1) A distorted voice asked, in a strange language.

"No, Gaster, I didn't tell them the truth…" Sans replied.

"QiS KLp?" (2)

"Because… They had some sort of an aura, like they've seen total destruction before… But still manage to retain all of their innocence, and their curiosity…" Sans answered.

"GjR IL SiDR HWax TuwO sHdAw?" (3)

Sans fell silent, but then found his voice. "Well… Then I hope they know how to defend themselves… Cause she won't let them get away from her without a fight…"

Wander and Sylvia moved near a large cliff side, and they instantly noticed the change in temperature. They discarded their sweaters and continued on their way, but they heard another ghost like voice.

"W-wElL, tHaT's NoT wHaT i ExPeCtEd...BuT... sT... sTiLl! I bElIeVe In YoU! yOu CaN dO a LiTtLe BiT bEtTeR! eVeN iF yOu DoN't tHiNk So! I... i PrOmIsE..." The voice sounded sad, and hurt. They elected to ignore it, as they had the first.

"Leaving SNOWDIN and making a new friend fill you both with DETERMINATION..."

Author's Note: Hello! This is the first authors note that I'm leaving for this story! So just to clear up something, the way Gaster speaks is like that because I cannot use Wingdings on the site… At least I haven't figured out how to, if it is possible. So I just decided to use some random nonsense instead, but I'll leave translations down here. Second, the Frisk in this story is female, just because. So that's all for now, sorry about the short chapter.

Gaster Translations:

(1) You didn't tell them the truth?

(2) Why not?

(3) What if they run into Frisk?