A/N: Gonna keep this brief, but contrary to my other UT fanfic, Frisk is male in this, and he starts out nine years old (though by the end of this chapter, which is kinda like a prologue, he is twelve). Uh, happy reading!

The fireballs just kept coming no matter what he said to try and stop her. He'd never been good with words anyways. Toriel's eyes brimmed with tears, yet her face was still hard, still trying to hide what she felt.

Frisk was going to cry too. It hurt. She'd hurt him. The fire may not have set him alight, but it burned. He wanted it to stop. Her attacks were harder to dodge than any monster he'd encountered so far, and he could make it stop so easily. He just had to… Had to fight… Had to fight… T-Tori--

He couldn't. He couldn't hurt her. She was the nicest being he'd ever encountered. Her motherly compassion knew no bounds. Even this. Even this. She did even this out of love for him. He had died to her once and seen the horror on her face. She truly didn't want to hurt him. But didn't she understand he had to…

Had to what?

Did he really have to move on?

Toriel… He loved Toriel. She was kind. She was caring. What was waiting for him beyond the Ruins anyways? Monsters who wanted to kill him, apparently. Pain. And after that? Nothing. Toriel was the first person who had loved him in a long, long time.

Now that he thought. Now that he really thought. The choice was simple. Barely a choice at all.

"Fight me or run away!" Toriel cried again. Frisk… Did not oblige her. He ran forward with intent. But not to fight.

To hug.

"Knock knock," Toriel said, punctuating each word with the physical action. With her other hand, she held tightly onto Frisk's, completely elated.

"Who's there?"

"Momma."

"Momma who?"

"Me! I have a son!"

"Uh…?" The voice on the other side of the door was understandably confused. Even with Frisk's limited knowledge of reproduction, he knew it took two people and more than a couple days to produce a child. Toriel simply giggled.

"My child! Introduce yourself," she urged gently, smiling down at Frisk.

Frisk froze. He hated talking. Words never quite put themselves together properly in his head and he always ended up spouting embarrassing nonsense when he talked for too long. He preferred to use sign language, but that wouldn't work too well through the door. "Ummm… Uh… Hi. I'm… Uh…" Shoot. He forgot his name for a second. "Frisk." There it was.

"Uh… Heya… Kid?" the guy said, intensely confused. "So uh… How…?"

"A child fell down!" Toriel exclaimed, squealing a little in excitement. "And he's going to stay here! And be my son!"

Silence.

"A… A human?"

"Yes! Isn't it wonderful? Oh, he's so beautiful…" Frisk's face grew hot, but he smiled at his mom as she went on and on about him. Gosh, he'd never had a mom. Nobody who'd go on and on about him. Nobody'd ever done that. "I wish you could see him."

"Uh… Yeah…" Frisk wished he knew what this guy's face looked like, because his voice and words didn't betray much. "So, little dude," the guy said, addressing Frisk now. "How're ya liking the Underground? I know it's not mulch but itsoil we got." He winked audibly.

Frisk giggled. He liked this guy. He was funny. Funny people were nice. "It's… Nice." Frisk hoped his tone of voice said something better because he hadn't quite said the words he meant to. He had understated his enjoyment of the Underground.

"Good to hear." The guy chuckled good naturedly. "And it's good to hear you're not alone in there anymore, lady." Frisk didn't think that was a very nice way of addressing a woman--it just seemed kind of blunt--but Toriel had told him earlier that this guy didn't know her name, and she didn't know his. He wasn't sure why people who knew each other for a long time wouldn't exchanged names, but there were a lot of things Frisk wasn't sure about, so he left it alone.

"Aw, I haven't been alone in here since you started coming to the door," Toriel said. "Anyways, I just wanted to share this with you. Is it okay if I bid you farewell? I must settle Frisk in."

"'Course. Hear ya tomorrow at the usual time?"

"Absolutely."

That night, Frisk slept comfortably. He wasn't afraid of the dark in Toriel's house. For whatever reason, the simple knowledge of his knew mother sleeping just down the hall was enough to keep him at peace. Maybe it had something to do with her totally awesome fire powers.

He didn't have any dreams, and he found that unbelievably peaceful. No nightmares. No anything. Just warm blankets and sleep.

He woke up and actually looked forward to the day for once. It was, in short, the best feeling in the world to him.

Frisk learned to be friends with the Froggits and Whimsums and Loox and Moldsmals and Vegetoids and uh… That weird dancing rabbit one that kind of made him a little uncomfortable. They didn't seem so scared of him anymore, so he could interact with them in peace. He grew to be fairly close to Napstablook too. The ghost seemed most comfortable just lying around in silence, and Frisk was okay with that. And sometimes, they brought some of their own music. It was pretty simple, but Frisk didn't dislike it. He hope their career worked out for them.

Toriel frequently brought him with her when they went to talk to the guy on the other side of the door, and Frisk became friends with him too.

Life was good for him.

And then over time…

It wasn't.