AN As suggested I am breaking the story up in chapters. Thanks for reading it ^^
His magic senses were horrible rusted in. It will take more time to...
"It will take more time to find the answer to this." He was sitting on a chair, white walls surrounding him, a screen in front of his eyes showing countless lines starting and stopping. A empty mug on his side, papers filled with messy calculation covering the table where his bony fingers were tapping in a rhythm of his his thinking.
"what do we know would be able to cause it for starters?" A second chair moved closer to him.
"For the anomaly to even exist, it ... something powerful. For it to mess the timeline this badly up... No one in underground would be able to stand up against such a force..."
He took a long breath, he knew this was a problem in the future, the anomaly was unsettling mostly because he was not having any luck in finding any indication how it resolves, his instruments could not look into the future far enough to see if it ends and how. How it starts? He had theories. A possible reason for its start maybe that the spell which created the barrier was acting up and wrapping the time. Another option was that it was a human doing...
"We all would be depended on their mercy." He didnt like the statement he spoke aloud. Hoping for once he would be wrong. The door slid open and both of them cheered up at the person whose lab coat was dancing on non-existing wind around them. It made his own grin grew a bit larger and it wasnt only because the smell of fresh cooked food was coming from the big plate he was holding.
"Who made you be late? We were waiting for your opinion, to make sure we two didnt again overseen the simple solution..."
A lick to his cheek and he jumped. It was dark the ground under him cold and his dog was nuzzling his cheek afraid. The other one was pressed against his back eyes staring into the dark. Guarding him. "My Blasters." He spoke removing his hand from the magic.
"I think we have come face to face with the anomaly I detected all those decades ago." Picking the leashes he started to lead them back through the darkness. His movement on autopilot.
"It appears I have to solve two problems. The barrier problem I cannot even address until the anomaly has been dealt with."
They came up to the tent and he crawled in, the anomaly wasnt going anywhere and without instruments he couldnt do any adequate observation, even less data collections. He will have to wait for daylight to inspect it radius, maybe it wasnt affecting the whole underground and maybe there was another way inside he could find? From somewhere the items in the dump must be coming...
As he closed his eyes he found it intriguing. He never even dream of studying the anomaly from outside. He forgot that tidbit until now, that it was a problem he had his eyes on back then... What karma must he have, that he the one who studied this phenomenon ended up witnessing its creation as an outside observer. One of the best position for a man of science.
To top it all off, it was a human who triggered it. Like his fears stated.
Not any human, no greedy man, or jealous woman, or corrupt person, or trigger happy madman, but a child.
A child bearing resemblance to them, in his mind there was no doubt that the kid he saw must have fallen in the underground and triggered the anomaly.
He wondered if the timelines were knitted with the fate of the child. If they were... Then any attempt on the child life, while trying to collect the soul would end the current line and start a new one from a point where the child was not in life danger. With no one to remember, everything will repeat. Would the kid remember?
It would be merciful if they dont.
So he assumed they would. His worst case scenario, he will work from there. The anomaly will take priority...
That night it rained, in the tent Gaster was sleeping his dreams filled with theories and plans, mixed with grey skies and chanting. Wing and Ding were using the distracted human, or was he a monster, as a pillow. Both shying away from things they saw today. And just beside the cave entry a rock sat in the growing mud. A rope around it curling in the mud till it reached a bundle of wet letters. Laying forgotten. Each of them leaking ink, the words slowly being erased from the paper they were once written with great care.
In the morning with the sun high in the sky that what was left, now a ink stained clump was picked up.
With no word spoken it was slowly and delicately carried back to the camp and soon all that remained was burning in a campfire, its ash carried off by the wind and across all of Ebott. As if the letters never existed, the only proof they did was one spot on the ground where the ink was mixed with the drying earth.
Ten days passed too quickly.
He nearly forgot himself and stayed longer. That wouldnt do, he went to the nearby town and asked if any children were reported missing. None were. He worried for the strength of the human soul. They definitely had enormous power to be connected to the anomaly, but that didnt mean they were mature enough to handle it responsible.
Ergo why he needed their back story. To know what made them come to that mountain in the first place. As well as why they run away from him. Thought that maybe simple a instinctual reaction to someone chasing you.
He will need to buy a car. How he desired the abilty to short cut right about then. Too many things he will have to transport over, as well he will need a dry place to store his machines and research...He needed to build a fitting house with a lab preferably on the mountain itself. Maybe pinpoint where hotlands have to be and do it over what he believes to be the labs.
His followers would have adored the idea.
Which lead him that he will need to buy land, pay construction workers to build a lab. Then pay them some extra to never speak of it.
He as well had to obtain the materials for the machines he had to build for his task.
He was in a desperate need for money. A lot of money. And he couldnt get it fast enough.
Unwillingly, but aware this was the only way he left back to the uni. Jeremy, was his solution. He could beckoning him into a few high risk high payout situation. But to do that he will have to firstly sweeten the deal they already have.
More invention.
But before that he will finish something he wanted to do before. He had to be aware if the anomaly would be able to affect his soul or not. If the magic that he felt in the air on the eight evening, just when the sun was setting, reacted with him. It was only briefly, several minutes at best. He had no idea how much magic leaked into the air even less how it came to it? The barrier wouldnt let anything escape. Especially not magic in the air.
The only theory he could offer to his restless mind, was that the barrier was gone. That was absolutely impossible, because of the anomaly still existing after the 'leak' vanished.
He looked at his reflection in the window. Back at him stared a wide grinning male, his eyes tired and hair a mess. The scars looking more prominent in the poor up, and one under his eyes. The eyes who were focusing into the distance. A human who had a lot before him.
He couldnt throw himself into work and ignore the existence of the word sleep like he wished. Instead he felt burdened with the social interaction. It was like everyone in the world wanted to spend time with him, right about then. He dropped for a weekend to his foster parents.
It made them happy.
He couldnt deny them.
Maria and Dave wanted to hang out, so he did. He doubted that Dave would ever again provide him with another puzzle piece. Not after he had such a big part already done. There were still holes of void watching him from the deepest parts of his mind. Parts where memories should be... Still he owned them even if they didnt realize it. He was simply repaying his debts.
Yet, he was wrong. Dave once more proved he can be useful to him, unknowingly. Dave told him that his grandpa would move back to his childhood home to live. The old man claiming that the Ebott air is cleaner. The home of the old man was too far from where he needed it. Even so he was invited to visit it anytime.
He could stay with Dave grandfather to save money until he finish his labs. On other hand Maria was announcing what she deiced on becoming. A reporter, a journalist in hunt for the story of the lifetime. Gaster filed that information in his mind with low importance. The only story he could imagine for her to use were all connected to Jeremy and the invention he would be making for his roommate.
Four weeks with barely, any sleep. It was finally done.
He was watching his soul.
It was the most miserable thing he glanced at in his whole experience as soul researcher. His first coherent and distinct thoughts that he had after seeing it, were if he should come up with a new word for it. Because the word soul wasnt appearing as suitable much.
From afar the soul would maybe appear as a red human soul. The main color of it was red, and the shape was that of a heart pointing down. A characteristic of a human soul. The problem was that the red color he was seeing was fluid determination. Not a soul but a soul trait, that was for whatever reason keeping the heart shape. Quite fascinating.
He didnt know that the fluid determination could behave like that.
Pretending to be a human soul.
His actual soul...
Well... his soul was a collection of shards suspended in the determination fluid. The pieces were quite small and were mostly white. Some shards when he observed them with a strong magnifying option had tints of different colors. The shards if he followed them carefully would outline a hearth form as well, but one that pointed up. A monster soul. That answered his identity questions. He was a monster. With a soul pretending to be human, in a human body. It filled him with hope that maybe his skeleton was actually monster in nature and it simple got human skin, muscles and organs attached to it. More research will be needed.
In the end it was no wonder his soul pained him when he sensed it, without the determination it would be dust, then without the determination it would never shattered into thousands of pieces... fine it was more like hundert's but still.
He dared to imagine the reaction of monsters to the state of his soul. The king would be frozen in place mount agape. Toriel would jump him and pour healing magic into his soul. His lab followers would panic and try to restrain him to a bed, until he recovers. He would hug Gaster until his ribs would start to loudly crack and the other would not sleep and simple watch him patiently like a hawk till he was back on his legs, smuggling him cups of coffee. While reporting him to his followers if he even dared to work.
Weekly checks, and overseeing progress, regular counting of the number of... shards is recommended. He deiced, it will be the least he could do for them. They would be proud he was actually thinking of his own well-being for a change... If only so he could work on the anomaly and barrier.
Time passed and he found himself in the company of humans he would had prefer to avoid. The police.
Jeremy was sitting beside him, the demonstration of his invention playing in front of them. Non lethal weapons to take down lethal threats. Better drones for observing threats. He felt like he was biting in a lemon... It was worth it. He befriended a few key personal, nice words, trust and two cups of coffee later he was allowed to look into the police report.
"Frisk." The child name was Frisk. They were reported missing good two weeks after they became missing. After more research he was positive that the kid was a happy one whose life was anything but nice to them. He became even more determined to hurry up with his preparations. Worry for them curling around his soul.
Pushing oneself to work even more and faster when he was already running on no sleep technically speaking...was maybe a bad idea. Scratch that, it was a horrible idea. One moment he was screwing something down and the next he found it interesting his eyes were closed. He opened his eyes to see that he was in a hospital bed. Scribbling of a pen bringing his attention to the side. Jeremy in a suit was eating an apple while writing on a stack of paper.
"You slept for five days straight." The man spoke without even looking at Gaster. He made a grunt sound as a response. Hands moving in gestures of wonder.
"The doctor for a while though you fallen into a coma there." Jeremy said crumpling the paper into a ball and tossing it in the bin.
A second voice echoed in his mind. "Dont ever do that again. We thought you fall down..." It was gone, he felt too tired to go after it. "I'fine." He spoke with a rusty sounding voice. A thumb up while the other hand pointed on his chest.
Jeremy snorted. "Your flea bags sure didnt think that when they howled and barked up so loudly the whole city block heard them. Found you collapsed over some really strange machines." Jeremy looked at him, once more the man looked intrigued and curious. The pen was put down and he was offered a glass of water.
It felt heavenly.
"Under deal." He spoke much easier, as he was slowly pushing himself into a sitting position. Jeremy sighed heavily. A document was put in his lap. The words were dancing in front of his eyes.
"You wanted to buy some land. The price was a pure rip off. So I took over and pushed it down into a reasonable range. Once you signature is on that line it will be yours." Gaster blinked at the dancing letters again. The contract was in the workshop with him... Buried under a bunch of his research paper... Jeremy didnt knew about his intentions... His chest clenched when he realized the other snooped around his things. Finding the documents and took it in his hands to lower the price...What else did he saw or took?
He will need to create a better security. One no human or human agency will be able to break in. He couldnt remember if everything was written in his language or not.
"... Are souls real?"
And there was his answer something must have not been written in his language of symbols.
"Under deal." He responded flatly, not looking up from the paper in his lap.
"There were quite a few pictures. Really realistic looking pictures, tracing a recovery progress of some sort...Had to wonder if it were pictures of a soul... Was it yours?"
"Under deal." He hissed, unaware that both his hands went to cover his chest. Disliking how on point the guess was. He felt trapped, his pulse has risen the highest it ever been. Jeremy stood up. He awaited an attack, his muscles ready to jump into avoiding. A long forgotten itch in his spine awoke a survivor instincts. Dodge.
"Six months." He blinked, that made no sense with the conversation they were having two seconds ago. Distraction tactics? He meet the human eyes. Different intents were coming of him. The confusion was obvious so Jeremy continued.
"You have six months to yourself. Finish your doctorate, give time to that obsession you obviously have with the mountain. Become healthy and rested. Once the time is up I will await you to give me something big. Or nothing will be under deal. Understood, my friend. " He bit into the apple leaving by then only the core in his hand.
The human spoke and Gaster pushed the itch in his spine down, forcing his muscles to relaxs. Jeremy wanted to still keep the deal... was it because he hoped he could gain access to the proof of souls? Sure that was something big but how exactly would it bring money? He didnt know. Still the time he will need, so he nodded slowly accepting to give him something worth enough to keep his lips shut about what he saw. On the logical side a bigger invention would bring more money, right?
"Great. So G, I will await you to call me if you need anything. You appear to have trouble with overpay things." Jeremy waved and throwing his apple core away moving around the room to collect his papers. Gaster followed his actions, it nearly appeared as if with that everything was settled...
"...Construction workers..." He spoke his hands moving adding the missing words, and the other froze, looking over to him. Urging him to expand the sentence, the hand movements not meaning anything to him. So he obligated. "I need construction workers to build me a private work-lab on this land. And keep shut afterwards. "
"Ok." Jeremy smiled, eyes twinkling in a way, Gaster couldnt place. Was it intrigue? Cheerfulness? Greed? No? Yes? ... It didnt mattered as long as he kept his word and gave him the funds he needed.
He recovered, he got the doctorate done. Officially becoming Dr. Gaster. It felt good. Like obtaining a piece of yourself back. He socialized to calm the worry of the people he knew. So they would stop bothering and interrupting him. All of it a time waste he had to put up with. He slowed his working enough so he could have regular naps and meals.
Picking plans on how his lab will look took way too much effort and way too many questions he had to answer.
Dave came to help him move, all instruments were in boxes. All papers and data in locked boxes. He didnt question anything. He was thankful that Gaster would keep an eye on his grandfather while he waited for his house to be build. His friend worried that loneliness was getting to his old man. Yet the stubborn man didnt want to move back with rest of the family.
Gaster found it an acceptable exchange, be a friendly and enjoyable company and in return have a free stay and a place from which he could start collecting data. He could do that.
In four weeks the construction was planned on starting, he planned to use that time to collect data points. The first night he tracked up and found the anomaly was unchanged. He felt guilt that it took him so long, but it was unavoidable. He was already working to the bone.
The first few days the old man wasnt talkative which suited him fully well. Every day he would go up the trail his blasters in tow and some instrument in hand. There was magic in the air. Not much but it was there and breathing it assisted his soul to heal. He was fascinated to watch two shards pieces slowly fusing into a slightly bigger shard piece. With that tempo his soul will be whole in a few decades time.
Noon of the sixth day.
The barrier did break. There was no denying with the numbers on his instruments going crazy. He detected where the leak of magic was originated. He was too slow to come to the top before the barrier was reestablished. He put up cameras around the place. A cliff clearing looking towards west. The anomaly was wrapping around it making it unable to come too close.
Every day he would come up the trail and collect data. On the seventh day since the previous iteration his instruments picked the changes in the barrier. He arrived at the clearing just in time to observe a fascinating phenomena.
At first there were no changes, but then the light changed. Inside the anomaly it became sunset as if the light itself was bending under time. It was late afternoon outside the anomaly he noted as he kept observing. He waited and noticed someone walking out on the cliff. It was Frisk.
They were alive and the barrier was broken...
So their soul wasnt used to break the barrier?
Before Gaster could allow his mind to dwell on the fact monster followed the human outside. Captured by the view they came up to the cliff and stared out towards the sun.
His hand touched the wall of the anomaly, like a glass wall he was allowed to see in, even hear them but they wouldnt be aware of his presence.
"Oh my..."
"Isnt it beautiful, everyone?" The king spoke and Gaster nodded, whispering an affirmation. The voice was the same like in his memories. He felt determined to destroy the anomaly, now that he knew the barrier that sealed them down was broken by their own efforts.
He heard Sans and Papyrus voices, he tried for so long not to even think their names so he wouldnt miss them. Now that he saw them, now that he was only several steps away from them, all the emotion ripped themself from his control. He will destroy this anomaly, he will do it. Even if it the last thing in his life he will take it down so he could be by their side.
"THATS THE SUN!? WOWIE! I CANT BELIEVE I AM FINALLY MEETING THE SUN!"
"Just you wait till you seen the moon." Gaster spoke, remembering sans love for space, and stars. How could it have taken him this long to remember that fact. His two dogs looking into the anomaly and towards the monster and then back at Gaster.
"I could stand here and watch this for hours..."
"Yes, it is beautiful is it not? But we should really think about what comes next."
"Oh, right."
Even when she said she couldnt be the queen any longer she still pulled Asgor mind to that what has to be done. Decision that have to be made. He took a deep breath, years ago Asgor was promising war on the humans. Their weapons are fearsome but he will prepare for it. What ever his king wish is he will give his all to make it a success.
Yet, there was Frisk standing beside Toriel, unharmed. How he wished he knew what happened.
"Everyone..." Asgor started, Gaster carefully listened. "This is the beginning of a bright new future. A era of peace between humans and monsters."
Hearing his king's words filled him with determination and hope.
Peace.
Not war.
But peace.
Not revenge.
But Mercy.
The humans were not ready to accept monsters, just yet. They were working on accepting them self. But maybe he could assist. Push them into the right direction so when he destroys the anomaly they all would be able to greet the monsters. The military. He will have to do something about the military. The different countries politics as well. He had to make the word monster a brand with ton of positive recognition. They wouldnt like the idea of magical monsters being allied with only one government.
Human rights.
He will have to ensure they all get human rights as soon as they are out.
Maybe as an ethnic minority it would work out?
"...Will you act as our ambassador to the humans?"
The man outside the anomaly blinked before he started arguing hands waving. "You cannot put a kid in such a position! No diplomat will take them serious! Do not get me started at the humans minor working laws. Their parents will not allow it, and I would know, I am keeping a eye on them. Papyrus optimistic outlook would be much better suited as an ambassador. It would be like putting a adorable puppy in front of them, one you cannot say no to...and humans are weak towards puppies...and kittens..." No one heard him... His blasters sniffing around, used to his outburst by this point.
Yet the tall skeleton started running towards him, for the briefest moments he let himself believe that he was noticed.
He wasnt.
The tall skeleton stopped in front of the wall that was the anomaly, two steps off to the left where he stood. Gaster looked at him with a smile, yet the smile dropped. Papyrus had a somber and tired look on his face. It didnt suit him at all... It reminded Gaster too much of his own mirror reflection. Briefly his eyes closed and fingers inside the gloves curled, a deep breath he took in and a big smile was on his face again. His friend jumped him wrapping her hand around him in an arm lock.
Gaster eyes searched the scene, he couldnt spot Sans. Was he attempting to short cut out the anomaly? Or did he walk behind those stones? There was a camera there, it will record him either way. He wanted to understand, and he was determined to solve this. Alphys and the King joined shortly the now loudly laughing skeleton. Yet Papyrus eyes were not on the monsters surrounding him but at the human child.
Hope.
He was hoping for something... for Frisk to do?
Gaster joined him in watching the human, interested what that may be? He was overflowing with determination as he listened to what was Toriel saying to them, to their response.
"Note to self. Research adoption laws." She took Frisk hand and started to lead them to the group.
He wanted to question, he wanted to find out. Frisk looked sad, even guilty as she turned her head away from everyone. He would have missed it if he wasnt focusing on the kid.
You cant give up,
No.
He would not.
The anomaly needed to shatter.
And. He. Will. Shatter. It.
Dark.
Darker.
Yet Darker.