First Undertale story, yay?! I've read so many stories about this wonderful game, and I finally decided to just jump into the bandwagon and start the ride! I had this idea for quite a long time, so I finally decided to pull it off. I was wondering how I would make it work, but I found out a good way to keep it going and I'm ready to show my work!
Please note that this is one of the very first stories I ever write (in fact, it's my first full story, as I only wrote a few one/two shots that I didn't upload to FanFiction before this), so don't judge it too hard. English is not my first language either, so please, if you find any sort of error, don't be afraid to tell me! I still try my best, though.
To avoid confusion as you read through, this story takes place a long time before Frisk falls into the underground. Thus, the monsters are just a tiny bit younger, and so they have different personalities, though they won't vary a lot, and only some of them sport minor changes in their appearance - you'll see who as the story progresses.
Now that this is said, on with the story!
-Prologue-
Everything was dark. From the distance, the many twinkling lights of the city could be seen, dancing like fireflies in a pond. Bathed by the light of the high up moon, freely ruling the sky with no clouds to hide its beauty, Mount Ebott stood tall and mighty among the darkness surrounding its every tree and bush and rock.
Everything was dead silent, save for a tuneful cricket concert and the shrill cry of a bat swarm fluttering around the mountain. Peace could be seen in the air, handing out happiness and a charming calm all over the place, and not letting any disturbance come by and startle the critters of the night.
The sound of hurrying footsteps, however, was the only thing that disrupted the night scenery.
Night bugs and little animals got out of the way as a black shadow ran through the path without stopping. Light, frantic, nonstop, the footsteps of a running woman didn't go past unheard. The rattle of a rope ladder folded between her arms sounded like a strange melody, and the white sheets peeking out of the basket she held danced in delight with it, accompanied by the soft, cold breeze that helped it wave around like a playful ghost.
The human held the bundle protectively against her chest and her two skinny arms surrounded it like it was the most beautiful, valuable treasure the world had ever seen. Crystalline tears of pure fear and remorse ran down her pale cheeks as she climbed up the narrow path leading to a cave in the mountain, not slowing down even despite the steepness of the trail.
The sound of leaves, pebbles, and branches crunching under her hurrying feet was replaced by the sharp clicks of shoe against rock as she entered a cave with little to no light to greet her, and everything was as dark as the deepest parts of a peaceful sea, forcing her to stop as a measure of protection; tripping with a treacherous rock in the way would be her worst mistake at that point.
Sharp breaths escaped her lips as she came to a halt at the edge of a hole, a large hole that seemed full of darkness, nothingness, despair; but that was her final destination. The heavy pants were shaky as she left the basket next to her, with the same care a sculptor crafts a delicate ice statue, and tied the knot of the rope ladder to a protruding rock near the mossy wall of the cave.
Without much effort she let the ladder fall down until the ropes vibrated as it reached down, and she seemed to want to cry harder after a whimpering sigh. It was time. Her eyes were filled with water and her nose painted red when she looked back at the now unmoving blankets. Even after all the running the baby was still asleep, and was as peaceful as the moon itself.
She grabbed it careful not to wake her precious girl, and as gently as possible, went down the ladder. She hesitated for a second as the ladder moved more violently than she thought it would have, but she knew she had to come down. She could barely see where the ground below was, she could barely even see the steps, but she had to go down.
It was that, or the baby would die.
Holding the rope with one hand and the basket as tightly but as carefully as she could, she tried to maintain balance and stepped down slowly. The rope ladder kept swinging forward and backward, shaking, but the girl wouldn't stop. She was halfway there, she wanted her baby to live.
She pulled her foot up when she sensed something that wasn't a step in surprise, but relaxed almost immediately, and knew she was there. Knew it was time.
For a few seconds, she held the basket with both arms and looked at the bundle of sheets inside of it as she came down. The little girl was still sleeping. Tear drops could be clearly seen in the white blankets as the mother cried, her lip quivered, her eyes became waterfalls.
She gave it a motherly look. Behind the curtain of tears that clouded her vision, there was a blue gaze that, deep down, knew it was the correct thing to do. After her husband's unexpected death, she was left with nothing but her child and an aching void in her heart that would never heal. She had no money to sustain her baby and would lose her house soon.
Nobody could take care of the child.
The woman was sure even the monsters that inhabited the underground were capable of being more humane than anyone in that old, rusted town at the edge of oblivion, a town that nobody remembered.
And besides, no one down there would have a SOUL dark enough to kill a defenseless baby. Would they?
She settled the basket down, and could feel her arms trembling, almost hearing them begging her not to let go, but she could do nothing else aside from screaming internally. She had to leave. She had to turn around, never look back, and never return to the abyss. She wouldn't see her baby again, she could not look at her again, or remorse would take over her and lead them both to their doom.
With an echoing whine that could make the most evil and murderous of spirits give pitiful cries, she climbed up the rope ladder as fast as she could, no matter how violently it swung.
Then there was nothing.
No sound. A mother's cries faded with the ladder as it was pulled up back to the surface, never to return. Down there, the melodic night orchestra of crickets and bats went unheard by monsters, always. In the underground, those sounds did not exist; would not exist.
He watched the basket intently, just as if it were an alien object.
Flowey had merely seen the last bits of the ladder's silhouette being pulled up to the unreachable surface, but his attention was driven towards the basket only. Silence engulfed everything as the sentient flower popped up next to it. He wondered why anyone would have risked their life coming down there only to leave a bundle of blankets. What was the point? Flowey couldn't understand.
He flinched ever so slightly when the blankets moved.
They moved like something delicate was trying to pull them aside with little to not strength at all. Flowey tilted his head at the eerie movement, and it was then when he came to a delightful realization. Only a human could've gone down there, and thus, that meant it had to be a baby. An easy kill to keep him entertained.
More curious than anything, he used a vine to gently pull off the two or three white sheets that covered his next victim, and was met with a weak, blinking gaze. Teal orbs opened to look at the flower tiredly, and the little creature yawned silently. Bits of short, auburn hair covered the rosy cheeks on the pale face, and the baby merely shook her head in a failed attempt to remove them from her sight.
It almost seemed a pity to kill her. Flowey would've liked something more entertaining, that child probably didn't even know what a flower was, and had absolutely zero skills in FIGHTing. Babies' SOULs, human or monster, were the weakest of them all, but it was something. After all, how long would it take him to see another human and have the pleasure of being the first to kill them?
However, Flowey didn't even have time to summon a single bullet that would be more than enough to end the baby's life before a shrill cry pierced his hearing and made him shrink back in shock; he hadn't been expecting he child to start crying like crazy, even when he hadn't done anything yet.
And that wasn't even the worst part. Footsteps could be heard coming towards his direction, and Flowey felt a sudden urge to want to destroy everything around him. He had the baby right there, and he had lost his chance to kill her.
But he wouldn't let her go that easily.
Before any eyes could see him, he quickly disappeared underground before Toriel could make it there.
A muffled gasp escaped her as she covered her mouth; a broken heart could be seen in her crimson eyes as she approached the whining creature. She didn't doubt a second before carefully picking up the little girl, and her cries seemed to stop for a moment.
"Who could have abandoned you here…?" the goat monster asked the empty space around her, seeing nobody around. She couldn't understand why someone would leave a defenseless baby in a world where anything could kill her; she knew that, before abandoning a child so young, she would rather die.
Her pained look, pained at seeing such cruelty, was replaced by a motherly one as she and the baby locked teal and red eyes. In those pearls she saw faith, she saw a good SOUL. It almost reminded her of her own son.
A small smile pulled at her lips. "Do not worry, little one. I will keep you safe."
She nuzzled the little girl's nose, enough to make her cries drown and let a tiny laughter come out instead. She looked up; there was nothing but the distant night sky, nobody that was watching over the poor creature. She walked over to the basket, placing the baby onto the warm blankets and wrapping her up with them. Toriel took the basket with her, for she had no cradle or anything else that could serve as a bed for the toddler, and moved on.
Moved on under an 'innocent' gaze.
Flowey watched her as she disappeared from sight. It wouldn't be the first time she had ruined his chances to kill, but he knew she wasn't going to get away with it. All in all, it was a human. Humans never last in the underground. That baby would get killed, be it by him, by the Royal Guard, by the King, by any other monster.
No matter if he was her murderer, or it was someone else, he would be there to watch that tiny little SOUL shatter. She wasn't meant to last.