Home Grown chptr1

Freelance Research in System Ketchup is what his papers read, the true word blocked underneath blue crayon, and Gaster made a mental note to tell his sons to stay out of his work papers. Next to the paper’s vandalized title were doodles of three stick figures that Gaster knew his youngest had drawn as they vaguely appeared to be him and his boys… why the smallest had a cape on he may never know.

Gaster would emit, though, that it was a nice touch to see on a boring day like today and in such a dull room. The lab was boringly quiet and the eggshell white walls offered no excitement nor did the black and white checkerboard titled floor. Most of the other scientists left early or even didn’t come into the lab on Friday, but Gaster was too neck deep in his research to leave; even though he wanted to.

His sons were staying over at his friend’s place until he got off work so Gaster didn’t have to worry. What he did worry about was what lay before him. His desk was covered in papers that held long and, at this moment in time, rather boring equations and solutions. Most of them were failed problems but he had to keep them filed so that he didn’t repeat a calculation later on. Gaster sometimes wondered why he wasted his time on this silly project of his.

Freelance Research in System Kinetic-Knowledge is what he named this little side task of his and just as it stated he was doing this on his own time when he really should be working on the core. But even the Royal Scientist got bored with working on the same after so long so Gaster decided to start this activity as he called it to keep his mind fresh and clear.

But on days like this he questioned his choice on taking on such thing. It was tiresome, more than the core sometimes, and dull but every day he always found himself looking forward to working on it.

The project, though its title a bit ambiguous, was mostly Gaster trying to understand how the human body works in comparison to a monster one. Knowledge of how humans functioned was known very little by monsters, aside from basic knowledge like breathing, eating, etc. and Gaster wouldn’t lie when he said he was curious about how human soul’s managed to stay in a human.

With monsters it was their magic that held them together and held onto their souls, but with humans they had very little magic in their body and determination, though a very powerful thing couldn’t hold a soul to a fleshy body.

He gave this project the titled it had for this very reason. Research on humans wasn’t a sought after subject topic and many monsters that did were looked down upon. Many monsters saw no purpose in studying the humans who were the reason for them being trapped underground, and plenty of monsters just lived with the fact that humans were evil and lived above.

Gaster knew what was taught in the schools, the war and the vileness of humans, and though he knew it was cruel what was done to monster-kind he never agreed with the way humans were represented. Humans were not evil, they were just fearful and scared of what monsters could do and had acted rashly. It didn’t make up for what they did but Gaster didn’t hate the humans.

He actually found them rather interesting. With the information he had managed to gather he found out that there was more to a human than a bag of flesh and their unfathomable amount of determination. And with this project he hoped to learn more.

But with a quick glance at the clock on the wall Gaster saw it was getting late. He hadn’t told his friend that his children would be sleeping the night, and though he knew his friend wouldn’t mind he didn’t want to be rude and make it a habit. Gathering up his papers and depositing them back into his manila folder Gaster collects his things and makes his way out of his personal lab/office.

Sliding his slender arms through the sleeves of his black trench coat Gaster teleported himself back to Snowdin where he, his sons, and his friend lived. Gaster didn’t like wasting his magic on teleporting himself places, he tried to only use it in dire circumstances, but today he just wanted to hurry home and spend some time with his sons.

Walking through the slight flurry of snow that began to fall, Gaster soon made it to his friend’s home. Giving the door a couple knocks Gaster waited for only a few moments before it opened and he was barreled into by a blur of blue and red. Luckily he caught himself from falling, this time, and smiled down at what had attacked him and would not let go.

Sans, his eldest son, was hugging his leg like his life depended on it and was smiling up at him with a glint in his eye sockets that only a boy at the age of seven could have. Papyrus, his youngest and five years younger than Sans, was sitting in his brother’s jacket hood and was reaching up to him; wanting to be held. Picking up the child, Gaster was met with giggles as Papyrus batted his face with those tiny fists of his.

“You’re late.” Sans said grumpily, though his smile never fell. “Grillby started to make dinner without you!”

“Did he now?” Gaster said as he managed to step inside the house and out of the cold.

“He did.” A new voice spoke up and when Gaster lifted his head he was met with the form of his friend. The fire monster was leaning against the door frame that led into the kitchen and his arms were crossed against his chest in a casual manner. “And he is making you stay to eat because he also knows that you didn’t have anything all day.”

At that Gaster smiled sheepishly and a purple blush formed on his cheekbones. He did have a bad habit of forgetting to eat something when he was at work and Grillby always berated him about it. Honestly without the constant reminders from the flame monster Gaster was more than certain he would collapse during the day from having no energy.

“PASTA!” Papyrus shouted happily as he tugged on his father’s coat.

“Sounds good,” Gaster laughed lightly as he pulled the red sleeve of Papyrus’ onesie down. “Need any help?”

“Nope.” Grillby said as he stood up from the wall. “I already have two helpers, but it seems as though they left their posts.”

Sans was the first to react, dethatching himself from Gaster’s leg and reached up for his brother. Handing Papyrus to Sans, Gaster watched as the two went back into the kitchen. Now that he was alone with Grillby, Gaster watched as the fire monster walked over to him. Though he really didn’t have much of a face to read Gaster knew Grillby was smiling.

“How are things at the lab?”

“Good, the core is coming alone nice. It’s not quite finished yet and is a bit unstable but soon we should be generating enough magic and power to spread it all over the underground.” Gaster said the two talked. “At least I hope so.”

“Don’t worry; you weren’t given the title of Royal Scientist just for your looks.” Grillby said with a chuckle. “If anyone can solve this it’s you.”

Gaster smiled but it was more a forced one than anything. More than half the underground was without light and power and monsters couldn’t always be wasting their magic to fix this problem. Places like Snowdin were lucky enough to have this luxury for the sole reason that Gaster lived here. The core, though not finished, was able to power at least his lab and a bit of the town. The core would have fits though and sometimes the monsters of Snowdin could be without power for a while.

Grillby looks like he is about to say something but when a shout comes from the kitchen both adults’ attention is pulled out of the conversation.

“DAD! GRILLBY! PAPPY IS EATING THE NOODLE BOX AGAIN!” Sans’ voice vibrated from the kitchen and the sounds of growling could be heard which could only be Papyrus trying to keep the box away from his older brother.

“What is it with my child and noodles?” Gaster asked as he shook his head and followed Grillby into the kitchen.

“I don’t know, what is it with you science?” Grillby asked. He never truly understood the sciency stuff Gaster did or talked about.  

Gaster only smiled at the fire monster’s comment as they entered the kitchen. He could ask Grillby what was with him and cooking but he thought better not too. Grillby was just as passionate about his cooking as Gaster was about his science and though the two always quibbled each other good-naturedly on their favorite topics the older skeleton thought he would say their witty bantering for another time.

Right now he had to worry about getting his youngest son away from the pasta box.


.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.


Gaster hated Mondays. Mondays were the start of the work week and that meant he had to come in early to open the lab. After having dropped his sons off at the daycare Gaster again decided to be lazy and teleport himself to the lab. Normally children Sans’ age would be in school but Gaster saw fit to home school the boy. Sans seemed to enjoy it, he was never said anything against it and it was time he got to spend with his father and Vis versa. Papyrus was still too young to start school so Gaster had a few more years with only having to teach Sans.

Opening the lab Gaster stepped inside with a tired yawn. It was dark like normal and it smelled of cleaning solution and chemicals. Flipping the lights on Gaster walked towards his office to get the day started. Upon entering his office, Gaster was met with the still plain and boring atmosphere that he had left on Friday. Placing his bag on his desk and removing his coat Gaster then pulled out his side project’s folder. He had an hour or so until the other scientist came and he was going to use it to try out some more equations he thought up over the weekend.

Sitting down in his chair, Gaster pulled out the papers and began to jot down his problems. Sadly a couple of them were just repeats but a few were new ones that almost made sense but when it came back to the soul they failed. After so many equations Gaster grew tired of this and decided to rest his phalanges. Setting down his pen Gaster rested his head in his hands.

“This is pointless.” He said to himself. “Maybe there just isn’t a scientific reason behind the human soul... Maybe I am just over thinking it.”

Rubbing his temples, Gaster pushed his chair back to stand up but in doing so he accidently caused a breeze and it sent his papers flying. Letting out and irritated grunt Gaster bent down to pick up the papers but stopped when he noticed something. Two papers were lying next to each other and each held an equation he deemed a dead end, but now that the equations were up against one another and as Gaster read over them they… seemed to fit.

Picking up the papers, Gaster read over them and slowly he was finding that this could hold at least a starting point in how a human soul is able to stay inside their bodies. Forgetting about the other fallen papers, Gaster walked over to a machine. It was one he had created himself to calculate formulas and equations and test chemicals and compounds to see if the equations actually worked.

Plugging in the equation and numbers, Gaster watched as the machine mixed the chemicals and other various materials together. The machine gave a shudder before the little red light on it blinked to signal that the equation had been a failure.

Feeling his shoulders go slack, Gaster gave a depressing sigh. He should have expected this. All his other equations that he thought would work and had plugged into the machine had resulted the same way so why should he be surprised by this one. Reaching out to clean the machine, after every use Gaster had to clear out the used chemicals and dispose of them, he opened the panel where the chemicals were mixed and went to pull out the yuck.

Though as his hand reached into the machine something happened and it turned back on. Some gears turned and before Gaster knew what to do something cut into the bone of both his hands. The pain was excruciating and Gaster found himself screaming as high as his voice would allow and then some.

The machine grinded and cut into his hands and Gaster watched as his bone chunks and dust fell into the compound the machine had deemed a failure. The moment his matter touched the mixture it began to bubble and the once blue goop turned a bright red before turning to black. Startled by this Gaster tried to free his injured hands from the machine but it wouldn’t release him.

Watching as the now contaminated compound bubbled and hissed Gaster felt a great fear wash over him. When the now inky black substance started leak over its petri dish and onto his hands and into the mechanics of the machine Gaster wished he had come in late today.  The slime burned his bones and the machine started to spark as it touched wires and parts and all Gaster could think of was how he had left his sons at the daycare and how their smiles would be the last he ever saw of them.

As the image of his sons and how much he loved them crossed his mind the machine gave one final shake before it exploded in Gaster’s face.

And then….

Darkness.