WARNING: There is a severe panic attack-esque scene in this chapter. Please proceed with caution.
When Sans opened his eyes, everything was blurry. His vision was blurry, thoughts were blurry. He took a second to figure out where he was. His hands found rubble underneath them. His ears were ringing. The ground felt like it was shifting underneath him. The right side of his head was pounding. Clearly he had just been pummeled by something. Maybe he fell.
He grunted as he sat up, holding his head in his hands. As his vision started to clear, he noticed a lamp in the corner of the room flickering eerily. Being the only source of light that survived, it did next to nothing to help him see. But he eventually managed to get enough night vision to see the room.
He found himself in a dystopian-esque version of the lab. Furniture was broken and thrown all over the room, the walls and floor had been torn apart, papers and blueprints were shredded and scattered all over the floor, and the bent and broken remains of the machine were piled in the corner.
Sans slowly stumbled to his feet, barely able to hold himself up. He kept holding
his head as he dizzily made his way towards the machine.
"Gast-er?" He croaked.
It had collapsed into itself. Giant holes were all over it, buttons were missing, levers had been ripped in half. The entire back half of it was gone.
"Gasty?" Sans's voice wobbled as he fell against the entrance. "It's… It's over. The rift is closed. You… You can come out now."
Nothing happened.
"C-c'mon, Gasty." He let his hand fall to his side. "We need to write down the results. Try again, yeah?"
Silence.
"What was that thing you said?" He said, hearing his voice echo through the destroyed room. "Uh… Failure is just one step closer to figuring out the truth or some shit like that?" He laughed nervously. "Yeah… We… We just need to rebuild it! Start over!"
The flickering lamp sparked as the bulb burned out.
"... Gaster?"
Sans felt his way into the machine.
"... Dad?"
A piece of wire fell from the ceiling.
"Dad. C'mon, Dad." Sans said quietly, his voice breaking. He pushed the first buttons he saw, pressing them at random. They didn't light up.
"We… We need to help Asgore, remember?" He started pressing the buttons harder. "Save Asriel and Chara… Bring back the Queen… Bring back harmony between monsters and humans…"
"It… It's what we worked so hard for, right?" His shaking hand grabbed the first lever and shoved it downwards. Nothing.
"... C'mon. Don't do this." Sans felt tears fall down his face. "It's not funny."
He flipped the switch again. And again. And again.
"It's. Not. Funny!" He said, raising his voice and forcing out each word with each flip of the switch.
He tried it one last time, pulling it as hard as he could. It clanged loudly, but nothing activated. He started backing away from it slowly.
"... Oh god... Oh god no…"
He went to the next switch, frantically pulling it up and down.
"Stop it… Gaster stop it!" He yelled, pushing every button he could within his reach.
Sounds of panic escaped him as he moved from switch to switch, pulling them as hard as he could, slamming his hands on the buttons in between. Nothing was working. Nothing was working.
Dear god nothing was working.
He launched out of the machine and into the lab, scanning hurriedly for any pieces of the machine that had broken off. He threw aside what used to be a chair, frantically sifted through papers, searched in every crevice.
He couldn't find anything.
It had all been sucked in.
He fell back onto the wall he was next to, panting in exhaustion. He squeezed his eyes shut and tears lined his breath.
"Dad…"
He suddenly inhaled sharply, clenched his teeth, and ran back into the machine. He growled violently as he pounded all the buttons and flipped all the switches at the same time, slamming his hands down as the machine flashed blue. The ceiling groaned as it collapsed down into an even more severe angle.
But nothing turned on.
He fell on his knees in defeat, his breath shook heavily as tears started to fall on the floor.
"No… No, no, no! Come back!" He suddenly wailed, banging his fist against the metal. "Come back… Please..."
He didn't even have enough time to start really sobbing before he heard Alphys.
"Sans?" Came her voice from the hall. "I'm back with the-"
Her words were cut short as she gasped when she entered the room.
"What…" She looked around the ruins of the room until her eyes landed on Sans.
"S-Sans...? Oh my… Oh my god." She rushed over to him and dropped onto her knees.
"What… What happened?" She asked quietly as she put a hand on his shoulder. He froze under her touch, his whimpers coming to an abrupt stop. He slowly looked up at her. She withdrew her hand from him, blushing in embarrassment.
"Alphys… Alphys you gotta help me!" His voice cracked as he grabbed her shoulders. She squeaked in surprise.
"G-Gaster-The-machine-We-"
"Sans, s-slow down! I can't understand you!" Alphys interrupted, jumping out of Sans's grip. "W-what are you t-talking about?!"
"The-the machine failed, Gaster fell in!" He fumbled over his own words. "You gotta help me get him back! Please!"
"What?!" She yelped. "What are you talking about?! Who's Gaster?!"
"... What?"
Sans suddenly felt a burst of rage surge through him at her words. He felt the puffs of blue smoke rush out from his eye as he jumped up from the ground.
"What the fuck do you mean, 'who's Gaster'?!" He yelled at her, clenching his fists as they sparked, his voice morphing at his anger. "I'm NOT in the mood for jokes!"
Alphys cried out in terror and shielded her face from him. Sans realized what he had done as soon as he saw her fear and immediately forced himself to calm down.
"Oh god Alphys… Alphys, I'm so sorry." He said quietly as he slowly reached out to her. She flinched as she scurried half way across the room from him. He felt guilt twinge at him.
"Alphys, I'm sorry." He called from across the room, taking a step towards her. "But Gaster is in there, I… I need your help to get him back."
"B-but…" She whimpered. "I… I d-don't know what you're t-talking about…"
Sans stopped in his tracks. He could hear the sincerity in her voice.
"... Alphys? You… You really don't know?"
"No! I don't!" She cried.
"He… He's the royal scientist, remember?" He took a few more steps towards her. "You… You helped him build that machine over there." He pointed at the god-forsaken contraption.
"I… I've n-never seen that machine before in my life!" She claimed. "T-there is no royal s-scientist, Sans! What h-happened to you?!"
Sans was about to protest, when he felt something chemically shift in his head.
She… She was right. There was no royal scientist. That machine in the corner is a hunk of metal that he'd never seen before. What was he talking about? There was no Gast-
"No!" He suddenly shouted, slamming his hands on the side of his head.
"No… No, no, no!" He shook his head angrily. "Gaster is real! He… He created me!"
His eyes widened as he began to realize what must have been happening.
Gaster fell into time and space itself.
"Oh… Oh god." He felt terror rising in him. "Oh my god, no."
"... Sans?" Alphys asked timidly.
He immediately shot into action, closing his eyes and quickly teleporting to his house. As soon as he opened them, he frantically started running around the house, looking for pictures of Gaster, something Gaster owned, anything related to Gaster. He started demolishing the living room. Ripping apart the couch, knocking over the TV, flipping the table, looking inside every drawer, under every surface.
"SANS, IS THAT YOU DOWN THERE?" Papyrus called from his room.
He froze upon hearing Papyrus. He didn't even wasting time walking up the stairs. He just straight up teleported to Papyrus's door and burst into his room.
"Papyrus!" He cried, making Papyrus jump. He rushed up to where he was sitting at his computer desk.
"Papyrus, please, for the love of god, tell me you remember him!" He cried, grabbing his arms and gripping them tightly.
"SANS, WHAT ON EARTH ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?" Papyrus asked, raising his brow. "ARE YOU OKAY? YOU SEEM TO BE EXTREMELY UPSET ABOUT SOMETHING."
"Gaster!" Sans yelled as he shook him. "Please tell me you know who he is!"
Papyrus furrowed his brow in concentration, thinking hard.
Sans let go of Papyrus and hung his head in defeat. "You… You don't remember, do you?"
"... THE NAME SEEMS FAMILIAR." Papyrus stated. "ARE YOU LOOKING FOR THIS PERSON? ARE THEY LOST?"
"Woah, wait, you remember?!" Sans asked, flinging his head back up in surprise.
"I DON'T KNOW WHO THIS PERSON IS." Papyrus maintained. "ALL I KNOW IS THAT I'VE HEARD THAT NAME BEFORE. SANS, WHAT'S WRONG? YOU LOOK EXTREMELY DISTRESSED."
Sans suddenly felt the shift in his head again. Gaster's existence started blurring out of focus.
"No!" He yelled, banging his head with his fists. "Not again! No!"
He ran out of Papyrus's room in a blind panic, dashing into his. He dove into his dump of a room, flinging socks and tearing through garbage. C'mon… There had to be a picture of him or something.
"SANS, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" Came Papyrus's voice from the hall.
"Hang on, Paps!" He called out, hysteria edging into his voice
Once again, he scoured through everything. He crawled under his nightstand, flipped over his mattress, and looked inside every sock. All of it for naught.
He fell onto the floor in exhaustion. He had looked through the entire house now, and the memories he had of Gaster were beginning to slip out of his grasp. He cried out in panic and pounded his fists on the sides of his head. He couldn't forget. He couldn't forget.
Don't forget when he first succeeded attempting telekinesis and Gaster had patted him on the head and gave him a patient smile. Don't forget how he used to copy him when he was little, drawing scribbles on a piece of paper next to Gaster while he was taking notes. Don't forget when Gaster made Papyrus, bringing true joy into his life for the first time. Don't forget when he gave them the house that they lived in-
His breath caught in his throat.
He hadn't looked through the entire house.
He blinked his way into the back room. God, he hadn't been in here in forever. There was next to no chance that something was in here, but he had to try.
He yanked open the first drawer, almost breaking it from how hard he pulled. Just his luck, the old photo album slid out from the back. He completely forgot that he had it. He flipped through the pages, his eyes darting between the pictures.
Nothing.
Not a single picture had Gaster in it.
He flipped through it again. C'mon, c'mon. There had to be something.
His eyes suddenly caught a picture of himself and Papyrus. Something was… Off. The picture seemed wrong. They were both smiling, but an awkward distance apart from each other. Sans seemed to be leaning towards the empty space for some reason. Papyrus's arm was held out beside him, as if it were wrapped around someone.
Sans's eyes widened as he finally realized.
Gaster literally had disappeared from the picture.
"Fuck! Fuck! FUCK!" He screamed, throwing the photo album across the room.
He was disappearing from existence, and Sans couldn't stop it.
"Remember!" He yelled at himself as he started clawing at his face in a fit of hysteria. "DON'T FORGET HIM!"
He gasped loudly as pain suddenly shot all the way up his spine to his skull. He fell over onto the counter, being consumed by convulsions. His entire body started glowing blue as he desperately gulped for air and cried out, sweating and sobbing violently.
His body was literally rejecting Gaster.
"N-o!"
He forced his vibrating arm to pull open the drawer next to him, barely managing to pull out a piece of paper and a pen.
"D-don't you forget." He choked out, holding his hand still with his other arm while he scribbled.
He couldn't draw for shit. Let alone while he was shaking so badly. Tears and sweat dripped on the paper, smearing some of the drawing.
But none of that mattered.
He collapsed onto the floor when he finished it, gripping the drawing tightly as he curled up into a ball.
"Don't you fucking forget."