My Brother's Keeper – Chapter 11 Part I - (Final Chapter)

"Leave a light on. Home is no place for me."

He wanted to laugh.

After all, he technically got what he wanted. He was free from living and the responsibilities thereof. Well, almost. There was still the matter of the soul, that somehow, had come along with him to this, otherwise empty, place.

He looked down at his chest. He could see his body clearly despite the complete lack of light. A passing thought whispered to him that maybe he was just imagining his body. That everything physical or real about him was long gone. Dust in the wind as the humans said.

But Papyrus had acted like he was still real, somewhere, during their short reunion.

In fact…

His brother had acted as if he was merely trapped there. Not gone, forever.

Huh.

He hovered his hand over his chest, and finally, he touched it. His soul shone brightly through his bony fingers.

His soul. HIS.

He giggled. Such a horrid sound coming from him but he liked it anyway. He was that he still could still feel his body under his fingers. That he still felt alive. He wasn't kidding anybody -Not that there was anybody else to kid in that place- When it came down to it, he honestly didn't want to die.

Had he, ever?

Well…

It really didn't matter if he did or not. What mattered was that he didn't want to die now.

He laughed.

He laughed until he cried.

He was so stupid.

"I see my destination. Wish I had known my journey."

A happy ending. That's all Gaster ever wanted. It had been such an impossible goal for such a long time that he had never given much thought as to what a happy ending would entail.

What a happy ending would cost him.

This end, costed him everything. His home, his family, his life. His legacy. As a happy ending, this wasn't much of one. To be quite honest, it right down -well- Sucked.

He giggled childishly at the word. He didn't even remember coming close to giggling when he was previously alive. He deserved those confused looks from the monsters around him. It was a horrible sound coming from him.

He put a trembling hand over his mouth. Before him, a raging fire was in the process of destroying his former home. He had to admit that he hadn't intended for the whole thing to burn but once you got started it was admittedly hard to stop. The warm sensation of magic fire was intriguingly intoxicating. Maybe because it had been a long time since he had felt anything warm, or cold, or any other temperature.

The dancing flames inspired visions in his head. A small skeleton child running around and laughing at the silliest of jokes. Snowball fights. A nightmare soothed with nuzzles and hugs. The small skeleton child asking why his father was never around.

Another giggle was stifled under his hand. Then, from somewhere deep inside him he registered that he was also sad. Or that he should be. He tilted his head in self contemplation. Yes, he WAS sad. Yeah, those were tears in his eyes.

Oh.

Oooooooh.

These memories. These precious memories that weren't his. His soul's memories. HIS memories.

Why where they there, twisting his insides?

He spat feeling contaminated. He had no time to dwell. He had to travel back to the Core now that he had what he needed.

He separated from the crowd watching his house burn down. There wasn't much point to fighting a magical fire. It would put itself out once it finished consuming its intended target. Sure there was a general worry about why the fire started among the gathered monsters, but, if one had to be completely honest and happened to be in fairly non-judgmental company, they would admit this was the most interesting thing to happen in Snowdin in quite a while.

Gaster quickly wiped the tears away with his good hand and teleported into the forest.

.

..

...

Phasing back to the Core had been an extremely stressful experience. He must've laid unconscious for a while because when he woke his whole body felt heavy, sore and hungry. His fingers had been healed back into place but they were still difficult to move. It would take at least a couple more days before he regained full use of his hand again. Having a corporeal body seemed like a good thing at first, but it was so inconvenient at times.

Luckily any monster or human (human?) present at the Core at the time of his awakening had been holed up in the control center. He could see their shapes running around in a state of controlled panic, through the one big window that overlooked the deep lava pit. He had materialized in the catwalk just right under it.

Usually, this would be a problem, since it would still mean that he had to walk through the Control Room in order to leave the Core, but for Gaster it just meant that he would have to teleport.

So he did.

And right after he teleported, he fell to his knees. His mind was reeling.

Since when could he teleport?

When he first left the Void, his body was still more of a thought than something physical, so he could "phase" to wherever he needed to go with the help of the Core's power. But now that he was corporeal … now … now he was teleporting? He never had used his magic in such way before. Was it a natural evolution of what he had learned in the Void? Or was it …

… Oh.

No this wasn't something he learned to do. Sans did. He was accessing information that Sans knew.

The Core incident had not only affected him but had also affected the thief's abilities, and he had figured out how to use this mutation of his powers to his advantage. All on his own.

Gaster allowed himself to be impressed, if only for a moment.

It made sense. After all, technically, the thief was him. A defective, diluted him, but still him.

Of course he was smart.

He sat back on his haunches and concentrated suddenly curious. He wondered what other "discoveries" Sans had made.

Fragments of memories exploded inside his brain and he fell backwards. It was overwhelming!

There was a lifetime of them.

No.

Several lifetimes of them.

What? The memories were still vague and they seemed to repeat themselves over and over. He put his hands on the sides of his head as a sudden headache overtook him. Human children flickered in and out of view. These children could reset time? No … they were all different versions of the same child.

Time travel. No, more like time looping. They were actively destroying and restarting timelines and somehow, Sans was able to follow them even if he couldn't do the destroying and restarting himself.

He had seen this himself. Yes, yes, he had. During one of the few time where circumstances were just right for allowing him to visit the real world, even if for a few moments. He had seen the kid, yes. He hadn't realized that at the time that he had seen a human child. He had been so startled by the fact that someone had been able to see him that he had phased right back into the Void.

That had been unfortunate.

So, all those scenes he had witness from him rare windows into the real world had not been from his own timeline, but several new ones … In fact, all memories from that timeline stopped right after the Core incident. He suspected that this timeline he was in wasn't his original one, and that somehow, the thief had managed to escape it with Papyrus as well.

Without Gaster, they shouldn't have been able to exist anywhere else. Two entities without an origin source. How interesting and frustrating…

Such wasted power.

He wanted to know more but that's all his brief contact with the thief had given him.

He sat in silence for a few moment allowing his mind to settle.

Nothing had gone right. He wanted to laugh at the stupidity of all of it.

If he reclaimed his soul back now, in this state, he risked his own being being lost in that endless sea of memories.

Other monsters may eventually forget Sans but he would never be able to. His knowledge and memories would be part of the scientist, forever.

No, no, this wouldn't do at all. He did not want that traitor living on inside his mind.

He needed to find a way around this. He hated that he craved all this new knowledge. That he was envious of all the happy memories the thief had with his son.

He thought back on his notes and observations, perhaps the answer was there. He decided that he needed to return to where all began: To his lab.

The thought of his lab triggered another fragment of memory. He saw his son keeping something away from his grasp and laughing. He recognized the item as his journal. (How did he get that?!) Immediately the answer came as he saw his hand … the thief's hand… opening the drawer where he kept his confidential papers.

So Papyrus knew … he knew that early on…. Gaster should've known. His son did seem to change how he related to him around that timeframe. He wasn't as … trusting.

Damn you.

At least the thief had had the courtesy to feel regret at showing his young son the journal. He saw his son's face twisted with fear of … what? The journal? His father?

Damn you. Damn you.

He got up and dusted himself off. Not that there was really any dust on him but the gesture helped. He looked at his ragged clothes and mildly made note that he was lucky that they survived his "vacation" from reality along with the rest of his body.

The big rip on the side of his coat made him grimace.

He would make sure that when the time came to collect, he would make the erasure of the thief to be as complete and painful as possible.

"Don't follow me. I'll only hold you back"

Grillby did not appreciate the comments. Being the only fire elemental in town did not mean that he was responsible for all and any mysterious magic fire in town. The comments were all made in good fun –sure- but fun had no place in this instance. His good friend's house had been destroyed.

He knew that the skeleton brothers had a brand new home in the Overland, and by all accounts, they were happy. But he always felt that at least one of them would eventually return. That particular one being Sans, of course. This was no wishful thinking on his part. This was just him knowing his friend really well.

Sans had expressed often that he had no dreams of living in the Overland among the humans. That wasn't even his brother's wish. As far as Papyrus was concerned, he just wanted to see everyone happy and free. As for Sans, he wanted to see his brother's wish come true, for his brother's sake. Personally, he just wanted a chance to see real stars and learn about new scientific discoveries. He didn't need to live up there on a permanent basis to do that.

As social and outgoing Sans was in the surface, the fire elemental knew that ultimately, Sans was a creature of habit. He had his comfortable places and people that he preferred. The Overland was just too new and too unpredictable for his friend's tastes. He knew he would eventually make his way back.

He knew...

Ok. Maybe there was a little bit of wishful thinking mixed in there.

The house fire had died down to embers by early afternoon. The curious group that had surrounded the house at the beginning had dispersed by now and only the fire elemental was left keeping watch. His restaurant was no longer as busy as it once was, so now he only opened it at nightfall. He spent the daytime with his books. Reading and learning more about human cuisine, since more and more humans seemed to be visiting Snowdin.

He hoped things looked up soon. He didn't relish the idea of having to move to the Overland to make a living. He would, if he had to, he certainly had the means. He just preferred to postpone it until he didn't have to worry about it anymore. Monsters and humans alike liked to ask him why he stayed. You'd think that a fire elemental would prefer the Hotlands, at the very least, or to live in a sunny place in the Overland. For them, he always had the same answer: "I like the quiet" followed by a variation of "Would you like to order anything else?"

This answer, wasn't entirely true, but Grillby didn't let that stop him from using it.

He picked up a small piece of brick still hot from the fire. He played with it with the tip of his fiery fingers until it disintegrated.

That house and its residents had always been a mystery to him.

The brothers had just showed up one day and moved into biggest house in town. Nobody really knew how they came to acquire it but nobody questioned their ownership. They had a set of keys with them and seemed to know where everything was in the house, so that was enough for a regular Snowdin resident. Papyrus once mentioned to Grillby that he was pretty sure that they rented, and that Sans was the one in charge of paying for the rent. He never saw any overdue bills, so he figured that his brother was just really good at their finances. When Grillby asked who their landlord was, Papyrus had looked lost for a moment then shrugged.

"Some rich monster in the Capital" he said then moved on to complain about a dog that kept sneaking into their house and stealing all his "special attacks".

Grillby overturned a piece of burnt wood with his foot.

The next day after they moved in, Sans strolled into Grillby's and greeted everyone by name. He made friends easy and he looked genuinely happy and relaxed. When he approached the bar, he greeted Grillby with a familiarity of a longtime friend. What was odd to the fire elemental reciprocated this feeling. He felt as if he had known the skeleton for years. When Sans ordered a burger, Grillby knew exactly how the skeleton liked it.

"I'm sorry. Have we met before?" Grillby had finally asked when he brought the food over.

The skeleton regarded him for a few seconds before answering with a huge grin.

"no" he said "i just have one of those faces".

Grillby stared at the remains of a couch. So much for wishful thinking….

.

..

...

'WHAT HAPPENED?!"

Grillby whirled around to see a distraught Papyrus running towards the remains of the house. Not far behind him, Undyne and Alphys hurried after. The fire elemental walked quickly out of the wreckage to stop the skeleton from going into it, in fear that in his grief, he might get hurt. Despite there no longer being visible flames, the area was still very hot.

In the end, he didn't have to. The skeleton stop just short of reaching Grillby and fell to his knees. The bartender reached a hand towards the skeleton to help him back up.

Tears threaten to spill out of the tall skeleton's eyes. "OUR HOUSE! … OUR HOU... GRILLBY! WHAT HAPPENED?! DID YOU HAVE AN ACCIDENT?!"

Grillby retrieved his hand and straightened his back. "What? No!"

"GRILLBY! WHAT DID YOU DO TO PAPYRUS HOUSE!?" accused Undyne from just far enough to avoid the elemental's natural heat but still close enough to be threatening.

"I did not…"

"Undyne! I… I'm sure there is a good reason why he did it!" said Alphys trying her best to breathe through her nose and not pant her words out.

Grillby dropped his arms to his sides and looked up at the sky in quiet frustration.

" . . .Down" he said in one fiery breath.

"OH!" said Papyrus looking at his former home sadly. "THEN HOW….?"

Grillby offered his hand again and this time Papyrus accepted it and got back on his feet. "I'm afraid I don't know. It was already engulfed in flames when I got here"

Undyne and Alphys exchanged worried glances.

"No...nobody saw what happened?" asked Alphys.

Grillby spread his arms and brought them up in a shrug. "Everyone just assumed that it had been me" There was probably more sarcasm in that statement that he intended, but he hardly ever used sarcasm, so he wasn't sure. The few remaining monsters witnessing the abrupt reunion looked away a little bit embarrassed.

"I'm sorry" said Alphys.

"Yeah, me too" added Undyne.

"HE COULDN'T HAVE …. COULD HE?" said Papyrus, more to himself than anybody else. His voice sounded distant.

Grillby raised a fiery eyebrow. "Who's "he", Papyrus?" he asked, gently.

Papyrus didn't respond. Instead he started walking towards the back of the house.

"Hey, Papyrus…" said Alphys and hurried up to catch up with the skeleton. Undyne followed her.

"Who's "he"?" asked Grillby again as Alphys and Undyne walked briskly past him.

"His dad" answered Undyne over her shoulder.

Well, that just created more questions. And where was Sans anyway?

He followed the trio to the back of the house. Grillby had never realized that there had been a back room there. As he looked at the smoky remains, his instincts told him that the initial fire must've happened here. It looked blacker and more decimated than the rest of the house.

"Papyrus! Be careful!" said Alphys as the skeleton rushed into the middle of the former lab area.

Papyrus had never gone back in the back room after the Core incident. He had been subconsciously aware of its existence, but never felt the need to go back there. He looked at the burnt shapes around him, not being able to recognize what any of them had been before the fire. Maybe a table? A bed? A box? Their home was gone. Why?...

He looked around but he already knew it was of no use. There was nothing left. He looked towards Undyne, Alphys and Grillby and shook his head.

"Well, there goes plan b" said Undyne.

Grillby waited patiently for someone to remember that he was still there and politely explain what this whole situation was about, but after a couple of minutes of listening to the trio exchange phrases that mentioned things like "Core", and 'Shutdown", and "Soul" in tense tones, he was on the verge of clearing his throat for a second time.

It was when he heard Sans' name that he went ahead and cleared his throat loudly.

"What about Sans?" he asked.

Notes: Sorry guys, I been taking care of sick family for the last few days. I did not want to keep you guys waiting any longer, so I'm releasing this in two parts (Is a big chapter but it is the last one, so I ended up adding a bunch of stuff that I hinted at but I wasn't planning on adding, but then changed my mind and added it and it's looking to be the biggest chapter of the entire series. So yeah, bad planning on my part. In any case, I hope you stick around for part II.