In which a token is given.

Alphys had dozed off leaning on the table. The sound of the coffeepot being lifted from its place brought her back.
"Oh, y-you're up finally."
Sans silently emptied the dregs of the coffee into his cup and downed it. His eyesockets were black holes of fatigue. Alphys began refilling the coffeepot. Sans was smart, and a good worker when he felt like it, but he wasn't good for much in the mornings.
She was still trying to decide exactly how she felt about him. She trusted him a lot more than she had initially, but.
"Dr. Gaster isn't, uhh, back. H-he told me he was planning on being back by now, but he'd try for lunchtime if he was h-held up, and in the mmeantime we shhould keep working. I sent the Kodama out for the morning check-ups."
Sans grunted. His eyelights were starting to perk up.
"Anyway—"
"AAaaa."
"U-uh?" They turned and squinted at the Kodama, standing stock still in the doorway. His eyes were even bigger than usual.
"Aah. A. Fire monster."
"Hassen? What's wr-wrong with—"
"No, not him, no, I... apologize for screaming. I was startled."
Sans gave Alphys a skeptical aside glance.
"No problem buddy," he said. "That wasn't much of a scream. So what's up?"

The Kodama had been singing quietly to himself while he jotted down notes, leaning out over the prototype, when suddenly a nearby object which he had assumed to be a flaming piece of debris and had ignored stood up to a roughly six-foot height and started walking towards him. It was definitely not Hassen, and he bolted without waiting to see what it was. They hurried back outside and found the figure standing on the stone in front of the lab.
"It's out of the magma," murmured Alphys curiously, "S-so, it's not Hassen.."
"Uh," said Sans, shading his eyes, "Grillby...?"
".hello."
"Grillby! What are you doing here... Naked?"
".clothing is highly flammable. . it's easier to cross the magma fields without it.I apologize for startling you, smaller one; I had dozed off and it didn't occur to me that you hadn't seen me. . you and I share similar blood, do we not?I sense you are connected to the elements." The Kodama nodded eagerly.
"Yes, sir! And you—are you an elemental spirit? Really?"
".I'm an elemental. . really."
"O-oh, oh! A real—of course! I... yes, s-so cool.." the Kodama lapsed into an embarrassed silence. Grillbz continued.
"...and Sans, is there any particular reason why you've been staring at my crotch for the past thirty seconds straight?"
There was a moment of silence. Alphys and the Kodama both looked at Sans, whose eyelights had gone out again, perhaps in an attempt to look like he wasn't looking anywhere at all.
"Uh, no, nope, no reason at all. ..Sorry."
Grillbz snorted.
".this is why I wear clothing. . no one's used to seeing elementals anymore. . where is Gaster?I came to help him with a problem. . also clear some things up."
"O-oh, h-he's not here, but he left me in ch-harge for the day," said Alphys, adjusting her glasses; "sorry. H-he should be back by lunch I think?"
Grillbz sighed. ".no good.I need to get back to Snowdin by then and open the restaurant.I can at least try to communicate with the other. . it's around here, right?"
"The, uh, other fire spirit?" said Sans.
".yes."
"Uh... Have you seen him today..?"
". if he's in the area I can call him. . but you may want to go inside.I wouldn't want to damage your ears."
"O-oh? I'd much rather stay, i-if that's alright," said Alphys, stuffing her claws into her earholes. The Kodama clapped his hands over his own ears, and Sans shrugged.
"Got no eardrums to damage, scream on my dude."
Grillbz nodded, turned, walked to the edge of the magma and knelt. A moment later a sharp sound throbbed through the air. Sans felt it rebounding from the inside of his skull and clawed his hood over his earholes in a futile attempt to shut it out.
No wonder he was so confident he'd be able to reach Hassen.
Sure enough, a fountain of flame appeared far out in the magma. Then again. A little closer, and it became clear that it was Hassen, dolphin-leaping towards them. When he was within shouting distance he began chirping to Grillbz, swimming with his head above the magma. Grillbz whistled back—mercifully, not nearly as loud as the first time, though the sound was still piercing. Sans slowly removed his hands from where they'd been clutched at his earholes. The noises coming from the two fiery beings were all incomprehensible to him, but he could tell that Hassen was very excited to meet someone who understood him, and was doing much of the talking. Grillbz appeared to be giving brief answers to questions which piled one on top of the other, often interrupting a previous answer. Finally Hassen calmed down a little and spoke for some time. Grillbz answered, and Hassen gave a low whistle. Grillbz turned.
".I found out why he's spending so much time on the surface.I had wondered about that."
"What's he say?" said Sans.
"He's looking for someone."
"Who?" said Alphys, and
"What else? That was a lot of talking," said Sans. Grillbz sighed.
".now, how do I explain this to a bunch of small, crotch-fixated life forms?"
"S-sans, you make us all look bad," said Alphys.
"I wasn't! I mean! I just, zoned out with my eyes pointing at your crotch? You're really tall! It's practically on my eye level!"
". Sans . stop.I believe this is what they call 'digging yourself deeper'."
Sans paused. He thought he detected a note of humor in Grillbz' voice.
"Are you laughing at me?"
". what. m e. . no . I would never stoop so low as to laugh at someone of your stature and mental density."
"Ouch?"
". anyway. . let's see. . easy answer, it's trying to find a fusion partner it was on good terms with until recently, when the other went missing. . it's eager to hear from them because they had a young one incubating somewhere inaccessible to it, it wants to hear if they made it. ..elementals can reproduce through fusion, though it's spirits are the same."
"Oh." Said Sans and the Kodama at the same time.
"Th-that's fascinating," said Alphys. "What's the o-other elemental look like?"
". spirit. . it's an air spirit."
"A-air? They can, they can do that?"
".elemental spirits have less variety but greater fusability than elementals. . if I try to explain all I know about the two species we'll be here all day and likely end more confused than we started."
"O-oh. So have you seen her?"
".the other spirit?no."
Hassen began speaking again, and Grillbz listened, then replied.
"...though I've just promised to search for them." He whistled something back. ".in my free time. . what have I gotten myself into."

Gaster woke slowly to the sight of an unfamiliar ceiling.

The night before, he almost hadn't seen the door until he was within arm's reach of it. The wind had picked up and the snow filled the air. He used his shield to scoop it away from the bottom of the door, knelt, and shielded the area with his coat.
"We're here, guys."
The spiders reluctantly left the relative warmth of his spine and crawled out from under his sweater, down to the ground, and under the door. One paused and looked back at him.
"What?—Oh, the message! I almost forgot, thank you! Here." He took the package, flattened it and pushed it as far under the door as he could, then watched it with one eye. Slowly it was pulled the rest of the way inside.
"Spiders are strong," he remarked. Then he set about packing together a low wall of snow in front of the door to keep the wind from driving more snow under the door and blocking it, and to shelter it a little. When he was done he sat down close behind it and wrapped himself in his coat.
He wished he'd brought a coat with a hood. It took him a lot of energy to keep himself warm with magic, and he'd need to do it on the way back as well, so he stopped after the first couple hours. It wasn't pleasant to sit in the cutting wind, but he didn't want to leave, he needed to be there when the spiders got back.
Not having skin was convenient in one way: he couldn't get frostbite. But also, it meant that the cold went right to his bones, and before long his entire body ached with it. He began rocking himself slowly, trying to think of something else, muttering verses as a distraction. He should have worn more layers. He should have built himself an igloo, or at least another wall to shelter from the wind. But there wasn't that much snow on the ground, the wind was spinning it all up into the far darkness.
He fell over. It startled him awake, and then he realized that he'd been asleep. That bothered him a little, but he'd be fine, he was a skeleton. He curled himself into a ball, covering himself with his coat. This was nice. He felt warmer. He'd just stay like this, keeping as much of himself out of the wind as he could.

Then, what felt like a long time later, he awoke, in a bed, suddenly aware of how stupid that had been and wondering who had rescued him. Someone from Snowdin probably, but he was far outside the town. Anyway, they'd saved his foolish tailbone.—what time was it, where were the spiders? He hoped Alphys was doing alright.
He sat up slowly, hugging the quilt close to him. Warmth clung to it. Someone very skilled with fire magic had infused it with warmth. He buried his face in the softness. It smelled faintly of fur and cinnamon-butterscotch.
He pulled back and opened his eyes. There were bits of white fur on the blanket.
Oh.
He looked around the room and realized that he recognized it, from long ago. It was the king and queen's room in their small house in Home. He slid out from under the covers and stood. A desk and chair, a bookcase, and a sad-looking cactus in the corner. But the smile fell from his face as he realized that the floor needed to be swept and a piece of paper which had fallen outside the wastebasket had been left there. Toriel was always neat. He didn't like this.
He walked towards the door, bare feet clicking on the floorboards. He looked down and realized that he was wearing a purple quilted dressing gown, a little frayed at the sleeves, in place of his coat—which had probably been caked with snow by the time she'd found him.
He entered the hallway and looked around, at a loss for where to start. He knocked lightly on the next door, then opened it. He caught a glimpse of another bedroom, dark and empty, started to close the door, then paused. He opened the door again.
It was a child's room, the bed only about the length of his arm (which, granted, was very long.) There was a soft, colorful rug in the center of the floor and a box of toys. He took a step into the room and stared.
They had all been children. All the souls Asgore had taken had been taken from children. Had they all come through here? At least one of them must have stayed long enough that Toriel had fixed this up as a child's room. It had just been a small guest room before, they hadn't had their child until after they moved to New Home. Then... how many of the children which had eventually been killed and stuck in jars had stayed here first?
A quiet sound made him turn. It was Toriel, dressed in black. Otherwise she looked just as he remembered her in her days as queen, tall, solidly built, with kind eyes and soft fluffy ears. Well—she did look different. Her fur was a bit disheveled, and she looked tired.
"I'm sorry," he said, realizing that he didn't need to ask. She nodded, began to speak then stopped and held her arms out.
"Gaster." He stepped into her arms and was startled at the desperate strength of her hug. "It's good to see you."
"Good to see you, too." He wrapped his arms around her shoulders.
A few moments passed, then she took a deep breath and stepped back, holding his shoulders.
"Come sit down, I made some tea."

Tea, naturally for Toriel, included a freshly-made pie. There was an arrangement of dried flowers on the table, and a warm fire crackled in the fireplace, filling the air with warm, cozy magic. Gaster breathed it in and a whirl of emotions tugged at his soul—nostalgia, loss, joy, the strange feeling of being a stranger in a familiar place.
"It's been a long time, hasn't it?" said Toriel. He nodded, searching with his hands for words.
"It's... quieter here now."
"Yes. But not too quiet. Not all of the monsters left, you know."
"Don't they mind having the door sealed?"
"No, that's only the main door, scarcely any of them ever used it to begin with—most of the monsters here are very small. There are cracks and passages that monsters who've lived here for a long time know of, that wouldn't be apparent from the outside."
"Oh. That's good."
"Few of them leave, though. Many of them were originally deterred from the trip by the cold of Snowdin, and so they stay here. It's nice. We've developed our own culture in isolation—we're not completely cut off, you understand; some do get out, though I try not to show my face around the monsters from the main caves, it causes a stir. I hope you've been more a part of society! Tell me, how have you been?"
"Ah, actually, I've been isolated too for much of this time."
"Did Asgore finally let you move to Waterfall?"
"I didn't ask him, I just went and built on an island."
"Good for you," said Toriel sardonically. Then she coughed and sipped her tea. "I'm still angry at him."
"I'm sure."
"So, not much activity in your part of Waterfall?"
"Ah, no. Well—" he described the magic he'd used to isolate himself. Toriel listened, eyes widening.
"You put that much effort into getting a little privacy?"
Gaster thought of reminding Toriel of where she was hiding, but that was different. She was the queen, everyone in the Underground wanted her back, including first and foremost her husband, who happened to be the king.
"I wasn't entirely in my right mind at the time, so yes. I... kind of broke away from everything for a long time and just lived out there."
"How long?"
"Aaaah." Gaster counted on his fingers. "I'm not sure because it's very hazy, but I think... Four... hundred... ish...?"
"Four hundred years?"
"Ish. Rounding down, it's got to be a bit more than—"
"Wait, four hundred years of living in Waterfall, or of living only in Waterfall?"
"As I said, it's, it's not... yes. The second one. Don't worry, I do get out more these days. It took that long to get my thoughts in order."
Toriel looked doubtfully at him.
"You do seem calmer."
"Well, I have just had a near-death experience, that tends to be rather sobering," smiled Gaster. Toriel nodded.
"Well, yes, perhaps calm isn't the right word," she mused. "More... alert?"
"I feel more unified in my thoughts."
"I'm not sure I understand, but you look like you're doing alright aside from your face, so I'm happy for you. Really though, don't isolate yourself completely. I know it might sound like hypocrisy coming from me, but you do need someone to talk to." Gaster nodded. "On the subject of your face, was it damaged by the cold?"
"No, no. It's been like this for a while."
"It wasn't quite that stiff the last time I saw you, was it?"
"No. It seems I'm getting old."
"Alas, we both are." She smiled.
"You look almost the same."
"Almost?"
"More tired."
"Tired, yes, that does sum it up rather well. Oh! Thank you for the dress, I did need a new one and it's hard to get enough fabric out here."
"I thought that might be the case. I hope you like it and it fits and, everything, I don't... I was just sort of guessing what you'd like based on... the impression I got of what you liked four hundred-ish years ago, which I may not remember all that well anyway."
"I do like it. Although I didn't look at it very well, hold on—" she got up, went to the kitchen and returned with the package. A fold of deep purple fabric was visible, emblazoned with the Delta rune. "I was quite lost as to who could have sent it at first. The spiders don't speak loudly enough for me to understand. How did you manage to befriend them—? Anyway, I guessed it was you from the inscription." Gaster cocked his head at the embroidery worked into the outer lines of the Delta rune. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. Blessed are the peacemakers, they shall be called children of God. "An old favorite of yours, isn't it?" he nodded. "It does seem appropriate. Thank you." He nodded happily. She unfolded the dress and another piece slipped out onto the floor. The outfit was in two pieces, a comfortably loose white robe with embroidered purple surcoat, both in very strong, sturdy, but soft fabric. Toriel rubbed it between her fingers and then pressed the folds to her face.
"Gaster, you're a better dressmaker than I am."
"Oh—ah—I just—thank you. I had a long time to practice."
He'd made tiny vests for kittens after he'd lost a litter to cat flu due to the constant chill and damp of Waterfall.

Toriel still had her face sunk in the folds of the dress and he thought she might be crying. He fiddled uncertainly with his hands for a few moments, then sipped his tea and focused on the pie. It was an excellent pie. Toriel lowered her hands and blinked several times.
"It's been so long since... well, since there's been any gift-giving out here. None of—well." She thought for a few moments. "Hold on, I want to give you something, too!" She bolted from the table.
"No, really, I—hold on—your tea will get cold," said Gaster lamely as she disappeared down the hallway. She returned in a few moments and pressed a small, uneven, smooth object into his hand. He cradled it carefully to keep it from slipping through his hands and looked at it. It was a lump of opaque gold-orange amber, about half the length of his thumb.
"Toriel!"
"Do you like it?"
"I love it, but this is a precious thing. Don't give me this."
"Nonsense. It's a pretty bauble, and it reminds me of you. I want you to have it. Is it my imagination, or does it feel warm to the touch?"
"It... it does. Thank you. I will treasure it."
She smiled as he lay it beside his plate where he could look at it, but then her smile clouded.
"Have..."
"Yes?"
"Have they all been killed?"
"...Four human children. Yes."
"All, then." She sighed. "And after all, I've done nothing."
Gaster stared at the amber for some time, searching for words.
"I don't... I don't think so. Anything counts. Just because you couldn't save them... you tried, and—did they stay here?"
"Yes, some for a few days, some only for a few hours. They were all too eager to return home."
"Understandable. But you cared for them as long as you could. That's all you can do."
Toriel nodded.
"Do you remember what you said about the orange trees?"
"...I do."
"Do you still believe that?"
"I don't know if it was from the past or future or only a dream, but—yes. For my part, I do."
She nodded, cradling her tea in a paw.
"I'm glad."

A/N:

(His house was supposed to be unfindable by outsiders, but it could be stumbled across by someone who explored Waterfall diligently, as Shyren did. She had known where it was for some time but had mostly stayed away. Her own reclusiveness made her respectful of others' boundaries.)
-Ch. 24

I think this is the only place in-story where I've discussed Gaster's hella-hard-to-find island. But I HAVE mentioned it. And here we hear a bit more about it. It'll be discussed more later if I get there (to the later.) We'll see. We'll hope. And try to keep writing.

It's been three-ish months but I'm finally back! And it is summer, and after testing a bunch of problem-causing and only-slightly-helpful meds I've got a good reaction to 5-HTP and I'm feeling a lot better! This past week I've even been doing writing again finally! It's been far too long, but I feel like I'm getting back into the swing of things, and the Third Annual Summer Wordcount War is occurring and Camp NaNoWriMo starts tomorrow, so I have motivation to do at least a couple more chapters before the fall. That's what I'm aiming for, hopefully I can actually make some good progress, there's a whole new arc I want to introduce soon and some things got resolved and some other things just got started in this one chapter alone and aaaaa

Anyway, I'm amazed and super happy whenever I see that people are still reading this, and some of them have been here for a long time or even from the beginning (I marvel at your dedication) and some people are new and just. It makes me super happy to see that people are still enjoying this, I will attempt to keep it going.

DETERMINATION!