Trial Through Echo
Rating: T because Light says ‘ass’ Pairing: GemLight (two Sans AUs by @ryliescreativecorner) Word Count: 2280 Summary: Gaster is terrible with children and has no desire to be responsible for another one. Which is unfortunate for him when BlackLight talks (i.e. forces) him into watching Echo for a few hours. Doubly unfortunate when Echo decides that using their magic to get into trouble and stress Gaster out is the best way to spend those few hours
“This is a job for your brother, isn’t it?”
“Nope.”
Light shook his head, juggling Echo in his arms. The child didn’t seem to be quite happy with the current arrangement, and was kicking their legs against their father’s thigh in what must be an attempt to be set free. Thankfully Light kept a firm grip on them. “My bro is busy toda-ay, and Gem’s bro-other is in some a-all day training session wi-ith his Undyne. Nei-ther of them can watch Echo today.”
Gaster sucked in a deep breath, eyeing the child with apprehension. It wasn’t that he was afraid of some kid, of course. He was the former Royal Scientist. He braved plenty of experiments and crossed the pathways over the Core before the handrails were even installed. There was nothing scary about a kid to him.
But…
He was never good with children. Light and Papyrus had been a fluke, experiments that he’d failed to go through with, and even when he took them out of the labs they essentially watched over themselves. All Gaster did was make sure there was some sort of sustenance and gave them clothes and made sure they knew how to get to school and…
Well, he hadn’t considered himself a father at all. A caretaker, if anything, but nothing more than that.
Light wouldn’t agree with him, but the fact that he referred to Gaster as ‘dad’ (something which still managed to make Gaster’s soul lurch unpleasantly in his chest) hadn’t meant much more than that Light was a victim of his amnesia, for a long time at least. He didn’t remember the horrible things that Gaster had done to both he and his brother. Even if Light claimed that he was no better, and that he had done and experienced things worse than anything the scientist did, it didn’t change anything. It was obvious in how Papyrus reacted toward him.
Nervous, unsure, refusing to initiate physical affection with him, referring to him exclusively as ‘the doctor’ or ‘doctor Gaster’… As a eternally forgiving monster, it was telling that Papyrus still struggled to refer to him as family.
He was becoming more comfortable with thinking of them as his family, but either way, Gaster still wasn’t good with children, and he didn’t quite want to be left with Echo. Alone. With only him around to keep an eye on the rambunctious skeleton child.
“I don’t think this is a good idea,” he said, hoping that he could still change Light’s mind. “Perhaps you can just reschedule your date until either Papyrus or Gem’s brother are available.”
“No-ot a good idea, my a-ass.” With a derisive snort, Light shifted Echo in his arms so that he could press them directly into Gaster’s. He let go, and Gaster jumped to grab onto Echo on instinct. “There you go-o, look. What a natural.”
Ohhh. Gaster’s mind went into overdrive. There was a child in his arms. A squirming child trying to get free. He awkwardly adjusted his arms for a better grip, resisting the awful urge to drop them.
“I mean it, Light. I’m not good with children,” he said once Echo settled down somewhat.
Light shrugged, already backing away before Gaster could think to push Echo right back into his arms. “You-ou’ll be fi-ine. Me and my bro survived your care, didn’t we?”
“The two of you were older and more mature and could hardly be referred to as children.” Months old they’d been, technically, thanks to the wonders that was science and speeding up their growth.
“Whate-ever. Point is, if you didn’t ki-ill us in the y-years that we lived with you, I think that you can survive a couple of hours with Echo. So thank you for watching them, ha-ave fun, and remember not to gi-ive them something like piles of sugar for dinner, ok? Tha-anks dad, see you later!”
And before Gaster could get out another word of protest, Light had pulled open a portal and stepped through it. It closed behind him with a blip, and Gaster found himself alone with Echo.
Oh no, this wasn’t going to be good. He could feel it.
Gaster turned Echo around in his arms so that he could look them in the face—eyesocket to eyesocket. They’d stopped their squirming to meet his gaze, tilting their head as if considering him in whatever way that babies considered other monsters. He frowned.
“Alright, Echo, if this is to work then we must set a few ground rules here.” What was Gaster even doing? He didn’t think that Echo was even old enough to understand what he was saying to them. “First, there will be no unnecessary magic use—especially blue magic and whatever trick your father has with that teleporting thing. Second, you will be nice and quiet and avoid getting into any trouble while you are in my care. Are we clear?”
A long silence stretched out between the two of them. For a moment, Gaster thought that his words had actually gotten through to them, and Echo was taking them to heart. Good. Perhaps watching over them wouldn’t be as difficult as he’d feared.
“Ooo!” They let out a trill, and shoved their hand right into his good eye socket.
Never mind.
A full body shudder ran through him. He extricated the offending hand from his eye socket and promptly set Echo on the ground. They stood on their feet, wobbling and waving their hands for a good minute before losing balance and sitting heavily down on the ground. They made a choked off squeal of surprise before falling into silence, blinking down at the ground as if it were solely responsible for their inability to stand.
Well, they weren’t crying at least.
“Alright. Now…” Satisfied that they weren’t about to go tottering away, considering that they couldn’t even stand, Gaster turned to survey the living room. One of Echo’s toys had to be around somewhere, right? Right?
No, it seemed. Papyrus kept things under strict cleanliness, and that hadn’t stopped after Echo had been brought into their lives. Gaster had never seen a house be so clean once a baby was introduced to a household, but if anyone was capable of it then he supposed that it would have to be his neat-freak of a son (his son, it was still so strange to consider either of the boys as such) especially if he enlisted the help of his double.
And thus there were no toys in sight. He’d have to take Echo up into Light’s room and see if there was anything for them to play with in there.
Gaster began to turn back to the child with a sigh. “Alright, Echo, let’s go—.” He choked off the rest of his words, staring straight at the spot where he’d left them.
Echo wasn’t there.
“Echo?” he called, the steady pulse of his soul quickening with a nauseating twist in his chest. Oh god, he’d already lost the kid. The kid who could barely even walk. Gem was going to murder him. “Echo where did you go?”
“Grampa!”
That was Echo’s voice. From above—oh no.
He glanced up, and sure enough there they were, little skull sticking out between the bars of the railing on the second floor landing. Gaster felt his soul stop when they leaned even further out to stick their hand as far out as it could go, waving cheerily down at him with the other hand holding onto the bars with the weakest grip he’d ever seen. It was easy to imagine them leaning too far forward and crushing their poor little skull on the ground below.
“Echo! Down!”
Everything was a blur of motion as he bolted, leaping over the baby gate that was useless in keeping Echo from managing to get upstairs. The terrified look on his face must have been somehow comical, because Echo shrieked with laughter, releasing their grip on the railing to teeter at the edge. He pushed himself to go that little bit faster, practically throwing himself to scoop Echo up and out of harm’s way.
His arms closed in on empty air.
“Wha—what, they—?” Gaster panted from the physical exertion, staring down at his arms, missing the baby he’d lunged for. How could they—? Oh no, why? He’d been prepared for blue magic, but apparently Echo shared their fathers’ ability to teleport. “Echo?”
“Graaaaampa!”
If it were possible, his face would blanch at Echo’s voice. He prayed to every divine above that Echo was just on the ground floor, nice and safe and sitting still until Gaster could get back down to them. His head jerked, spine stiffed as he peaked through the bars of the railing. And there they were, in a nest of sticky strings like some sort of toddler-shaped spider-ton, fingers entangled in its knots as they stuck to the wall.
The image of Light hanging from a hammock forced its way up from his memories. Oh. Wonderful. Echo shared another lovely magic ability with their parents. The only power that he expected yet to come from them was—.
Blue magic. Of course.
Mentally beating himself over the head, Gaster reached out to envelop Echo’s soul and with a ping! turned it blue. Little Echo burst into helpless giggles as Gaster forcibly extricated from the wall, bringing them through the air, over the railing, and into the (relative) safety of his arms.
“I’m not playing,” he told them, getting nothing but smiles in return.
He sighed, setting them against his hip as he carried Echo back downstairs and through the baby gate once again. “How do you feel about an early dinner and a bath? I think we’ve had enough excitement for one day, do you?”
“Ooopappa!” was the highly intelligent response from Echo.
Gaster nodded. “Right. I agree. Now… how do you feel about having piles of sugar for dinner?”
“’oogar?”
Aw. He found himself grinning. Now this was the sort of conversation that a man could get used to. (Not that he was actually going to feed Echo piles of sugar for dinner, but the idea of that little rebellion as revenge for foisting the kid on him was enticing nonetheless.)
“That’s right, Echo. ‘Oogar’. Your dad said ‘oogar’ for dinner so that’s exactly what I’m going to make you, doesn’t that sound great?” he asked lifting Echo up above his head.
With the answering giggle and delighted flapping of limbs, Gaster was sure that the two of them would get along just fine.
Unfortunately, after setting Echo in their chair so that he could make dinner (none of the sugar that he promised, but he didn’t think that Echo would care about the lie once they were old enough to understand what he said in the first place), the child decided that sitting still wasn’t their style. When he glanced over his shoulder to check on them, he discovered them missing. Again. Highchair and all. At least they hadn’t gone far, just outside the kitchen banging on the food tray. He left the chair there, and brought Echo’s food to them.
What would be the point of moving the chair back into the kitchen anyway? They’d probably teleport it again.
After a very messy dinner, it seemed that Echo was winding down. Their bursting energy from before seemed to have calmed—likely exhausted from all the magic they’d expended within the last short hour—and they were beginning to fuss. He scooped them up, allowing them to rest against his chest as he walked them about, losing himself to his thoughts.
All things aside, spending time with the kid wasn’t too bad. He didn’t think that he wanted to do it again anytime soon, but Echo was a good baby. That was… when they weren’t teleporting around and climbing walls. How did either of his sons or their doubles deal with a child like that? Papyrus and Light weren’t such a fright to be around when they were smaller.
(Although maybe that wasn’t much of thing to brag about. He didn’t think obedience, fear, and anxiety was much of a way to raise a child. Light and Gem were better fathers than Gaster could’ve ever hoped to be.)
Echo had been still for a while now, he realized with a start. He stole a glance down at the child, relief washing over him at the sight of Echo, little skull pillowed against his chest and eyesockets shut. Oh thank god, Echo had fallen asleep. His legs felt weak suddenly, and he edged himself down onto the couch, taking care not to jostle them and ruin their rest. He had no clue how he’d get them back to sleep if he messed it up now.
The both of them had survived Gaster’s babysitting.
He laid down along the couch, head on the armrest on one side and legs kicked up over the armrest on the other. Now that he wasn’t chasing the terror child around the house, exhaustion crept into his joints and his limbs felt like they’d turned into lead. Gaster was more than ready for what he considered to be a well-deserved rest.
Well, what better time like the present, with Echo already asleep as well?
Just as the thought crossed his mind, Gaster’s eyes fell closed. It felt like his body was sinking into the cushions, the steady breathing of his sleeping grandchild lulling him into peace.
Before he knew it, Gaster dropped away into the blissful dark of sleep.