CHAPTER SIXTEEN

"G-Gaster?" Alphys said for the second time. "Did you prank call me?" She laughed nervously.

"No prank," Gaster finally said. He wasn't sure how he remembered to speak.

Alphys was suddenly serious. "What…what happened?"

"Sans."

"What's w-wrong with him, Gaster?" She could just imagine all the different accidents that could happen at their lab.

"Alphys, they took him. I…I couldn't…I didn't even try…" He sank further into himself, curling up in the corner of the dark lab and breathing too quickly to feel any relief.

"Breathe, Gaster. Talk to m-me." She turned and walked to a quiet corner in the lab she was in. Humans walked around her, and she tried to ignore them.

"I couldn't stop them."

"O-okay, tell me who 'they' are."

"I don't know." Gaster was close to hysterical. "Center for Disease Control…they came in to take my research. I wouldn't let them, so they said they'd use force. Sans…he was trying to protect me."

Alphys knew exactly what Gaster was talking about. "We'll find him," she assured him quietly. "Tell me who took him. What d-did they look like?"

~LM~

Frisk frowned at her phone. Sans was supposed to have been there an hour ago. He had never been late for anything, but especially not a date. This particular date had seemed very important to him; they were going to have dinner with his dad.

It was a little unnerving that she hadn't heard from him in three days, either. He was usually the one sending her reminders about what they were going to do together on their date nights. They were always innocent texts, but she loved getting them.

Another two hours later, she decided to see if Papyrus knew what was going on. Maybe Sans had just forgotten about their date. It would have been unusual, but not entirely impossible. He had been really stressed about something at work for a few weeks.

The phone rang five times before it went to voicemail. That was another unusual thing—even when he was forbidden to talk to her, Papyrus still answered her calls. Maybe she'd really fucked up somehow. She shook her head at herself; Sans would have at least told her that she'd done something wrong before punishing her for it.

She tried one more time. When he still didn't answer, she turned to her third favorite monster. As the line rang with Alphys' Mew Mew Kissy Cutie ringback tone, Frisk tried to think of more reasons that Sans would forget about their date.

"Hello?" Alphys answered.

"Hi!" Frisk all but shouted; she'd been working herself into a nervous frenzy with thoughts of Sans breaking up with her.

"F-Frisk! What are you doing?"

"Calling to see if you know what's going on with Sans. He won't answer my texts and he's three hours late for our date tonight."

The line was silent for what felt like eternity.

"Alphys?"

"Um…I…they didn't tell you?"

Frisk felt the color drain from her face. "Tell me what?" Did something happen? Was Sans unable to answer his phone? "Alphys, they didn't tell me what?!"

"Oh, dear. U-um. Okay, Frisk, you n-need to sit down, because I need to t-tell you something you really don't w-want to hear."

~LM~

Frisk was filled half with anger, half with panicked horror as she stormed down the street to Sans' house. Alphys had to be lying, although Frisk wasn't sure why she would lie.

She pounded on the door, prepared to break it down if she had to. She just needed to see that dumb skeleton's face and hear another stupid fucking pun. Gods, it couldn't be true.

When the door finally opened, she was shocked into silence by what she saw.

Papyrus stood in front of her, both eyes glowing orange. His famous grin was gone—in it's place was a scowl that made Frisk pray to all the gods she could think of that she was somehow still on his good side.

"Papyrus?"

She couldn't bring herself to ask the question that she needed to ask.

His scowl softened and his eyes watered with orange tears. He nodded before he grabbed her and pulled her into a hug.

She hugged him back as tightly as she could, desperate for comfort.

Almost as soon as her feet hit the ground, every ounce of anger she'd felt before returned.

"How could you not tell me?" she all but shouted.

Papyrus pulled her inside and shut the door. He tried to think of something to say to her when Gaster came into the room.

"We didn't tell you because it's none of your business," he said with a scowl.

"What the fuck do you mean it's none of my business?" she shrieked. "He's my boyfriend!"

"He's my son and Papyrus' brother; can you really believe your bond to him is stronger than ours?"

She growled unimpressively and stepped closer to Gaster. "Let me tell you something, Doctor." She thrust a finger up toward his face. "I love him. I love him more than your damn logical words can describe, no matter what you want to say about me. I will do anything—anything—to help him. Don't you dare leave me out of this, do you hear me? I might not have magic or be able to summon weapons, but I'm not useless either. I'm smart. I know humans. And I swear to all the fucking gods that I will make every single one who touches him pay dearly."

Gaster looked at Papyrus for a second, then back down at the girl in front of him. He had to admit that he liked the girl's spirit.

"What do you mean summon weapons?" Gaster asked, trying to play dumb.

"Don't fuck with me, Gaster. I know all about Sans' magic and I know in my soul that it's the reason he was taken. He told me once that if humans knew what he was capable of he wouldn't be killed. He'd said there were worse things." It didn't take her a second to realize what they were going to do to him. "They're hurting him the way they hurt you." Her voice broke and she lurched forward, falling to her knees. She buried her face in her hands, tears overflowing and pooling in her palms. "Gods, they're hurting him." Her stomach hurt at the thought of him in any kind of pain.

She felt a bony hand on her shoulder and sobbed.

"Frisk, we need to plan," Papyrus said softly.

She couldn't remember ever hearing him say anything that wasn't full volume. It surprised her enough to look up at him.

"Okay. Can I please help?" she sniffled and looked at Papyrus.

Papyrus looked over at Gaster. His dad nodded, so he felt better about letting Frisk in on 'Project: Save Sans.'

"You realize you will probably need to fight humans?" Gaster asked.

"Yes, I know. I'll kill them if I have to."

"You would kill your own kind…for a monster?" Gaster wasn't sure what to think of that. With humans, it was usually their kind over everything else.

Frisk looked up into Gaster's face and made hers appear made of stone. "Sans isn't just some monster, Gaster. How many times do I have to say that I love him before you understand what that means? No human on this earth could ever mean more to me than he does." She thought for a quick second. "Maybe my mom and my brother, but that's beside the point. They're not the ones hurting him."

Gaster nodded. The look on her face told him exactly what he needed to know. It was what Sans had been trying to tell him all along—this human was different.

"Okay."

"Are we done arguing over this?" Papyrus asked. "I'd like to save my brother now."

They spent the next few hours trying to figure out where he would have been taken. They called in Undyne and Alphys who both had connections to human laboratories. Undyne worked security in one of the top facilities and Alphys was a scientist at another.

It was determined that Sans had been taken by a faction of the military whose sole job it was to find and contain any monsters with magic. They had disguised themselves as a monster training camp, when their small operation had been in the works since before the last war when it was theorized that magical monsters could still exist. Their purpose was two-fold: one, keep on the lookout for any monster that seemed capable of wielding magic that could touch a human; and two, if any were found, to find out how they used that magic.

"I'm quitting my job after this," Alphys said softly. "I can't believe my lab is associated with these brutes."

"You know you have a job with me," Gaster said. "I could use your brilliance."

Frisk wasn't sure why Alphys blushed. "I'm not that smart," she muttered.

Undyne smacked her shoulder. "Knock that off, babe."

"I don't hire idiots," Gaster said matter-of-factly.

"O-of course not," Alphys said quickly. "That's not what I meant."

"We could also use you in the computer room for this endeavor. I assume you'll be able to help?"

"Sans s-saved my life during the war, of course I'll be there for him."

Frisk looked over at Alphys, even more confused. "He what?"

Alphys nodded. "I can't summon…summon weapons," she stuttered. "I was cornered, and he saved me."

Huh.

"Don't feel bad, babe; I can summon weapons and I still had to rely on that shit to help me out a few times. Humans are unrelenting!" She punched Frisk in the arm.

"OW!" Frisk rubbed her arm. Her hand tingled a little, but she was sure nothing was broken.

"Sorry," Undyne said after Alphys gave her a dark look.

"We need to rest, and I say we get going early. Before the sun rises, even."

Frisk looked over at Papyrus as he spoke. If she hadn't seen it with her own eyes, she would never have believed it was possible for him to be so stern.

"Agreed," Undyne said heartily.

"Um," Frisk started. "Can I have a weapon to take?"

They all looked at her for a moment. "I mean, I can probably get something, but is there any way I could use something that one of you summon?"

Papyrus shook his head. "Anything we summon would be too dangerous for you; it could hurt you instead of allowing you to use it. We'll find something for you. For now, let's all go to bed."

Frisk decided she was going to sleep on Sans' bed that night. She curled into his blankets and sniffed his pillow. She missed him so much more now than she had ever before. She figured it was because she honestly didn't know what they were going to find the next day. For all they knew, the humans could have killed him by now.

She shook her head to get rid of the thoughts and pressed her face into the pillow.

"No," she said aloud, refusing to believe that he was that badly injured. "He's going to be fine." She sniffled and hugged the pillow tighter. "He has to be."

A/N: Thanks so much for reading! I'd love to know your thoughts!