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Gaster looks up at the sky, it has been months since monsters have left the mountain… yet he could not shake the feeling that one day, they might wake up, only to be back at the god-awful place. His hands won’t stop shaking, even as he takes a long drag of his cigarette.
Gaster tosses the stick before Asgore can go over and scold him for smoking again.
“Gaster… if you have anything on your mind… I would be open to listening-” Asgore had been talking throughout dinner and all Gaster had given him were half-hearted hums of affirmation.
“Gaster… I am going to throw away your secret stash of cigarettes is that alright?” another half-hearted hum, that was all he needed to know that Gaster isn’t really listening. “Alright then, I’ll go do that now-”
Only when the chair dragged did Gaster snap out of it. But he doesn’t pry, simply pretending to take a huge bit of chips.
Asgore sighs, sitting back down, he knows that Gaster would just go out and buy more anyway.
“I am really worried about you… you seem to have eaten less and less, you may be able to fool your sons but… staying with you… I notice more than they do…”
“(I apologise, I didn’t mean to worry you… it’s just I have a lot on my mind about the future of humans and monsters…)”
“Well, Frisk is doing a very good job being the ambassador for both humans and monsters… I’m sure that whatever it is, we can get through it… together,” Asgore smiles.
“(I hope so…)” Gaster lowers his head, his shoulders shaking a little.
This scene seems rather familiar for the same thing had happened when they only had each other left.
“Come now, I’m sure a good night’s rest will help,” Asgore smiles, half picking Gaster up, half helping him into his room.
In the past, their roles were usually reversed but after the experiments, their roles had reversed and still hold to this day. But Gaster has to let his mind wander away from the inevitability of resets and wonder how Asgore was holding up. The queen seems to not forgive him, while she does let him help out sometimes and could talk to him without giving him one of her disappointed looks, she still won’t allow him anywhere near Frisk or feel tense whenever he is near humans as if he would pull out his trident and start stabbing people.
It wasn’t fair, Frisk is technically much more dangerous than Asgore. But he shouldn’t judge… no one would remember what happened in those alternate timelines, however. The human would have no qualms about killing anyone that moved, including Toriel.
“How about a bedtime story, reading sure helped me sleep,” Asgore smiles.
Gaster didn’t have the heart energy to stop him and simply drifted off as Asgore’s low voice lulled him to sleep.
“Do you think we deserved this ending?” Gaster asks in a soft voice.
Asgore’s expression lowers, his voice slowing to a stop. He had half expected to see Gaster awake but found him snoring softly. Asgore smiles sadly at Gaster.
“I’m not sure about deserving… I have done… things I’m not proud of… some people might never forgive me… but I think… if I can do right by-” Asgore remembers Gaster saying that he wanted to do right by him.
Asgore sighs, he isn’t sure what Gaster did to make him this disheartened, but so long as they stayed together… he was going to help him, if he was so distraught by what he did, he must be a soft-hearted person… isn’t he?
Asgore wouldn’t say the same about himself, however… no matter how alike they are.
While Asgore tries his best to help Gaster keep his mind off things, planning outings and just simply praising him whenever he is working on something, he even asks Papyrus if they could join them in those family outings.
Papyrus seems to love it but he mentions that Sans often opts out of it, with Asgore there however he seems content to join in more often.
He would also invite Frisk and Toriel, then Papyrus would invite Undyne and Alphys. It became a whole reunion when the human broke the barrier.
Gaster is going to have the same slumps sometimes, but he would look at what he has now and with everyone’s help, learn to love again.