Eventually they reached a room.
With three doors.
All locked.
"OH GOD DAMN-" Undyne howled
"beaverdam." Sans interrupted, his eyes darting toward Papyrus as a warning. Papyrus wasn't paying attention to either of them and was instead looking around the room.
"SO…WHAT ARE WE LOOKING FOR?" he asked.
"A key?" Alphys suggested. Her eyes darted to Sans "Or…maybe notes?"
"tapes could work too. anything that has records." Sans said, beginning his search. "if you find a key, don't use it. it'll probably kill you. gaster was pretty secretive like that." He opened a random drawer lazily, took a brief glance inside, then lightly pushed it shut. It settled slightly askew and Sans did nothing to fix it.
"How would a KEY kill us?" Undyne muttered, beginning to flip over a table.
"the key itself won't. though they are superconductors. one touch to the electrified locks and you're dead." Sans explained. He picked up a loose paper, found nothing under it, then dropped the sheet again.
"Y-you don't look like you're trying too hard." Alphys muttered. She stooped down and began bundling stray papers, looking at them briefly to see if there was anything useful on them. Sans just shrugged.
Papyrus looked around the room, his eye sockets scanning the entirety of the room. He tilted his skull and thought a moment.
Then he climbed on top of Undyne's shoulders. She was thrown off balance for half a moment but regained it quickly and wrapped her claws around Papyrus's feet, balancing him.
"You got an idea?" she asked. Alphys and Sans looked up too.
"I THINK I MIGHT…" Papyrus said "IF GASTER WAS ANYTHING LIKE SANS, HE PROBABLY HID THE IMPORTANT STUFF ABOVE A CEILING PANEL."
"a ceiling panel? you're just being silly." Sans said, hoping no one noticed the sweat beading on his skull.
"NO I AM BEING BRILLIANT!" Papyrus grinned as he prodded the ceiling with the tips of his gloved fingers. "ALSO I READ YOUR DIARY."
"rude." Sans muttered.
"I THOUGHT THE PASSAGE ABOUT THE LADY BEHIND THE DOOR WAS ADORABLE!"
"ruder." Sans's face flushed a pale blue. "can we stop talking about this?"
"SURE THING, BROTHER." Papyrus chirped. "UNDYNE, CAN YOU MOVE BACK A BIT?" Undyne took two steps back and let Papyrus continue his search.
"Lady behind the door?" Undyne asked, eyeing Sans. "Who's that? Your girlfriend?"
"nah."
"JUST SOMEONE WHO HAS A BEAUTFIUL LAUGH." Papyrus said "ACCORDING TO SANS THAT IS."
"anyway, did you find anything yet?" Sans asked.
"NOT YET."
"WAIT!" Undyne snapped "I wanna hear more about-" Alphys put her hand on Undyne's arm gently, giving her a look that said 'please drop it'. She did. Not happily, but she did.
Papyrus poked and prodded at the ceiling for a little while longer. Sans and Alphys preoccupied themselves with picking up little things on the floor. Well… Alphys did. Sans sat on the ground and watched her.
"So w-wait…" Alphys blinked, she turned up toward Sans "If you can't unlock the doors, how do you go in or-" she swallowed, suddenly realizing the implication the finished question would bring up. She finished it anyway "…out?"
Sans shrugged. "dunno how gaster did it, but i just kinda….floop."
"Floop?" Alphys frowned.
"y'know. floop."
Alphys shook her head "No, I don't know. What does 'floop' mean?"
"well I guess for me it'd be more of a fwoosh."
"A fwoosh?" Alphys frowned "Sans you're making no sense-"
"well there's some different ways of instantaneous movement. You can floop or you could fwoosh." Sans said this as if it explained everything. "or sometimes it's a fwsh."
"What are y-you even t-alking about?" Alphys muttered, beginning to get annoyed.
"TELEPORTATION." Papyrus explained "UNDYNE CAN YOU MOVE A BIT TO THE LEFT?" she did.
"Wait, Sans can teleport?" Undyne asked loudly. She dragged out a sigh "That makes SO much sense."
"Oh- teleport-" Alphys suddenly huffed. "Wait, so that text-"
"what text?" Sans winked. He looked up to Papyrus. "howsit going?"
Papyrus shook his head "I CAN'T FIND A THING. BUT FEAR NOT, BROTHER! THE GREAT PAPYRUS WILL NOT GIVE UP UNTIL I HAVE SEARCHED EVERYWHERE! UNDYNE, MORE TO THE LEFT!"
"DO I LOOK LIKE A HORSE TO YOU!?" Undyne snapped. Papyrus seemed hardly phased.
"PLEASE?"
"Fine." Undyne muttered and complied.
"So…you can teleport, Sans?" Undyne asked.
Sans gave a shrug as a response "i guess."
"How does it work?" Alphys butted in before Undyne could say anything "Can you teleport anywhere? How far can you go? What does it feel like? Does it make you tired? Do you actually teleport or do you just move really fast? Do you see anything or is it just like 'bam here we are-?"
"it works like teleporting, no, pretty far, feels kinda like blinking, i'm always tired, teleporting is moving anywhere instantly, so i guess i do move fast, and things kind of go black for a moment and then I'm where i want to be." Sans said quickly "and that's enough questions."
Alphys flushed and ducked her head, poking her fingers together. "S-sorry."
"MY TURN FOR A QUESTION!" Undyne snapped.
"yippee."
"Do you teleport away from me when I'm trying to watch you!?" she snapped. Papyrus windmilled his arms as she suddenly jerked underneath him.
"UNDYNE!" he yelled, flailing. Undyne remembered what she was doing and stood still, letting Papyrus regain his balance.
"yep."
Undyne grinded her teeth but resisted the urge to yell in a slight fear she might drop Papyrus. Sans chuckled under his breath.
"So…. A fwoosh?" Alphys asked meekly. "This is the last question. I promise."
"that's the sound i hear when i teleport." Sans said.
"How about the floop-"
"you said that was the last question."
Alphys sighed, getting the hint he was done talking.
"FOUND SOMETHING!" Papyrus chirped as a panel shifted. He carefully slid the panel to the side and reached into the ceiling. Carefully, he took down another…tape.
"huh." Sans said, tilting his head as his brother jumped down. Papyrus handed it to him and Sans looked at it a moment, turning it over a few times and then shoved it in his pocket. "hey alphys, do you have a VHS or something in here?"
"Y-yes." Alphys nodded. "This w-way. Come on."
It didn't take too long to get to where the VHS was. It was stashed underneath a television wedged between two bookcases. A log was mounted on the wall, but to respect Alphys's privacy they didn't listen to it. The small scientist fiddled with the tape for a moment before fitting it into the player. The ground stood back, Sans sitting on the ground with Papyrus kneeling next to him. Alphys fidgeted a bit but settled on the floor next to Sans, and Undyne dropped next to her.
The television buffered for a few moment, and when it played the static came on first. And that slowly shifted to a blurry image of black and white. Gaster's eyes came on screen, narrowed into a glare. The camera angled tilted and shifted a moment, audio being just the sound of static.
The eye sockets widened into a satisfied gaze and the speaker took a step back.
It wasn't Gaster.
"sup." The Sans on the video waved lazily and shoved his hand into his pocket "hey, uh, if you need to find this tape… well…." He looked to the side before his eye sockets went completely blank
"Chances are you're gonna die."
A/N
Updating this on a Sunday this week. Why? Because honestly, I don't think I'll post on a Wednesday (I got a BIG test that day. Don't feel like thinking about this on top of taking that friggin 4-5 hour test.)
So I hinted a bit at Soriel there. Why? Because I love that ship SO much. I guess I can understand why people don't ship it, some people interpret their ages to be way too far apart (I think Sans is around 32 and Toriel is in her early 40s) or just want Asgore and Toriel to get back together. But I'm (not) sorry, Toriel made it clear she doesn't want to get back together with him. And there's nothing wrong with that and there's nothing wrong with her getting with someone else. As I said in the AN in chapter 1, ships will be glanced over and not focused on.
Mainly humor in this chapter. Why? Because the last chapter was mainly angst and fluff.
So… yeah. Things are starting to get interesting?
Replies to Reviews:
Guest- Yippery-Dippery Bob!
Frisk Dreemur- Kaleidoscope.
The Deductionist- How do you know it's not both?
TimeTurnerJasmy- Oh man, did that come off more romantic than friendship? Crudmuffin sandwich…. Oh well, at least you like/acknowledged the Alphyne.
Ilovecartoonsgirl- Oh thank goodness I got Undyne in character! I was really worried about that. Although I headcannon Sans USED to have a crush on Alphys, he no longer does (at least in my fics).
Tra la la, Arrc ha Eer Murd