"Come on, man, one shot'll do 'er in," a delinquent coaxed.
The smell of whisky was pungent in the kitchen.
"Mama, wus goin' on?" asked the youth in uncertainty.
A glass bottle shattered. Her eyes were glazed with fury. The bottle struck his head.
"It's yo' fault he got the axe!" she shouted.
Dishes fell off the table as the youth shoved his mother in retaliation. Her head slammed onto the floor, knocking her out.
He cocked the weapon in his trembling hands. He aimed the gun at her head, telling himself to do it, but the drive to complete the act was swiftly depleting. At the consideration of what he had done earlier, he pocketed the gun and absconded.
The sirens in the distance were harbingers of increased danger.
Lights. He needed to avoid the city lights.
He escaped the urban jungle and entered the nearest forest. In his panicked state, he stumbled on a tree root. He fell into a ravine, terror in the pit of his stomach. He screamed as if it would save him from the everlasting blackness of death.
And yet...the youth felt a peculiar sensation of serenity. Where was he? Had he ended up in heaven? No...the thought seemed ridiculous. After what he attempted and the life he had been living, heaven was out of his grasp now.
The youth opened his eyes and witnessed bright light cascading from what was above him. He squinted at the sudden brightness. He felt himself lying on his back, his body in a soothingly soft mass. He lifted his torso and surveyed his surroundings. He was lying on his back in a bed of flowers as yellow as the risen sun.
Just ta be sure...
He pressed two fingers against his neck, feeling a beating pulse. Yep, he was still alive. He was also thoroughly unhurt, apart from the wound on his forehead. He figured the scar would simply fit in with the others.
He arose and dusted off his clothes and took another look around. The flower bed was embedded into a small patch of grass in the middle of what seemed to be a room of some sort. On his left, he found a hallway. He remembered falling down here. He looked up, trying to see from where he had fallen. It was quite a distance from what he could see, and the walls around him were too steep to ascend. The youth had nowhere to go but down the hallway. Old habits kicking in, he secured the .45 caliber pistol in his waistband and crept throughout the hallway, his sneakers silently stepping on the cement floor.
The youth pinned his back against the wall when he approached the corner. He was unsure who, or what, would be waiting for him up ahead. He lifted the hem of his jacket and extracted the pistol from his waistband. He checked the magazine. No bullets remained.
"One bullet left? That's all you need, brotha. One ta the wig, and we get outta here..."
He shook the memory out of his mind and reassembled the magazine with the gun, reconcealing it. Just because he knew he was empty didn't mean everybody else in heaven-knows-where-he-was did. He discreetly peeked around the corner. He guessed it was another one of those sunflowers he had landed on earlier, bathed in a column of light, and separate from everything else. He exhaled in relief and chuckled to himself as he entered the room. There was no reason to act all "sheisty" because of one flower.
"Howdy!" a friendly voice said somewhere. The youth's eyes widened as he cocked his head left and right, crouching. As far as he saw, there was nobody in there, and nothing of interest in the room. He had an inkling that it was...Nah, nah, I'm just trippin'...
"Down here!" called the friendly voice again. Down here? The youth was short, only about 5'2" the last time he checked, so the probability of finding someone shorter than him wasn't too likely. The voice sounded as if it was from a kid, but there was none of the sort. By process of elimination, he looked down at the patch of grass at his feet. The flower he eyed earlier had a...A FACE?!
"I'm Flowey. Flowey the Flower!"
Aw, naw! Aw, NAW! The youth incredulously watched the flower's face crack into a jovial smile, which in turn made him create a mortified expression, trepidation held within his brown eyes.
"What is happenin'?" he asked himself, his voice shaky. A hand glided across his forehead, feeling the fresh wound.
"Hmm...you're new to the underground, aren'tcha? Golly, you must be so confused!"
Don't talk to the flowa, don't talk to the flowa, dis all jest a bad dream...However, the flower couldn't be any more correct. Instead of his consistent attitude of thuggishness and impudence, he was utterly perplexed at his plight.
"Someone oughta teach you how things work around here!" exclaimed the flower. Instinct. The youth bent his legs defensively and balled up his fists. Where he was from, something like that meant either getting curb-stomped, robbed, or killed. He blinked a bit as he pondered how ridiculous he looked, being defensive around a flower. So what if it talked? And if the flower supposedly COULD present danger, he'd simply wake up from this infernal nightmare.
"I guess little old me will have to do! Ready?"
The youth still wouldn't talk to the flower, but kept staring at him. It, he thought. A flowa ain't got a soul.
"Here we go!" Suddenly, the area around them got a bit darker, and the flower became brighter in the light.
"Here in the underground, we place a lot of value in souls, the very culmination of one's being. Your soul starts off weak, but it can grow strong if you gain a lot of LV," said the flower. It seemed to anticipate the youth's baffled countenance, as it went on, "What's LV stand for? Why, LOVE, of course! You want some LOVE, don't you?"
That's where the youth crossed the line. "Slow ya roll. G's don't get no love," he spoke finally, rebellion tinged in his voice. He crossed his arms and glared at the flower. This charade had gone on for long enough.
The flower wasn't perturbed. "Aww, you sound like you could use a little bit of LOVE. Don't worry, I'll share some with you!"
Somehow, the youth wasn't convinced. How could a flower "love" anything? Sure, it could talk, but does that mean anything with a mouth can love? And what did the flower expect him to do, "love" back?
"Down here, LOVE is shared through..." A few white dots emerged from the flower, floating around it, "little white...friendliness pellets."
The way it said "friendliness pellets" seemed more suspicious than an altruistic politician. Nevertheless, the "friendliness pellets" seemed harmless. They were probably just seeds, considering the source was a flower.
"Are you ready?" The seeds started moving toward the youth. "Move around! Catch as many as you can!"
Psh, this shouldn't be too hard, thought the youth as he unfolded his arms. He reached toward the nearest one and clasped his fingers around it. When he touched it, he felt the entire world shake. A fire raged in his body-no, his soul. Not one from the warm gentleness of camaraderie or friendship, but one that had cast an overwhelming sensation of despondence and forlornness. The pain he felt was in nowise physical; he'd been in one too many fistfights to mistake it. No, the agony had affected the very core of his being, with every part of his body erupting in aches.
The youth was brought down, kneeling and keeping balance with an arm. He was losing his grasp on life by the second. His body quavering, he looked at the flower who betrayed him.
What? Dis flowa over here CHEESIN' IT!?
It was true. The courteous smile the flower had once worn transformed into one of pure malice. At this point, the youth knew that it had planned this from the beginning.
"You IDIOT," taunted the flower, its voice warped in frenzied sadism. "In this world, it's KILL or BE killed." Doesn't sound too different from the hood, the youth thought in spite of his looming demise. "Why would ANYONE pass up an opportunity like this?!"
More "friendliness pellets" gathered around the youth, infinitely more so than the previous ones. There was no escaping it. He'd die here, where nobody knew or cared where or who he was. He couldn't even imagine how it would feel if MULTIPLE seeds hit him at the same time. His only solace was that it'd be over soon...
"Die."
The pellets slowly advanced toward the youth. The swiftly turning instruments of death cast a gloomy certainty on him, yet they were somewhat mesmerizing. He looked dead at the cackling flower of evil, using the last of his strength to produce a defiant stare. He would make sure his killer was the last thing he would see...
Suddenly, he regained his full strength, which startled him. The pellets weren't around him anymore. The flower's expression mirrored his. He heard a flame combust from his right. The next second, a fireball hit the flower right on the stem, the demon flying from the ground. The youth turned his head to view his savior.
The person (although the term was a stretch) looked like a tall, white goat dressed in a blue robe with some funky design on it, the top part looking like a Golden Snitch. The goat looked at him with a motherly sense of pity, something the youth hadn't witnessed in a long time...
"What a terrible creature, torturing such a poor, innocent youth..." After hearing her modulated, slightly higher voice, the youth discerned that the goat was a female, about his mom's age. The resemblance to a genuine mother the goat possessed was uncanny...and unprecedented, as far as the youth knew.
With the recovered strength, he rose to his feet. He was still reveling in the fact that he had been on the brink of death, and yet here he was feeling just as fine as he was before he met "Flowey."
And yet, he still felt apprehensive toward the new entity. First a talking flower, then a talking goat? He would have loved to chalk this up as a convoluted nightmare, but the experience he just had confirmed with conviction that pinching himself would get him nowhere.
He shot a cynical stare at the goat lady. There was a loving look in her eyes.
"Ah, do not be afraid, my child. I am Toriel, caretaker of the ruins. I pass through this place every day to see if anyone has fallen down."
"Toriel, huh?" spoke the youth, his eyes darting to the grass patch. "Well, good lookin' out. Guess if you ain't stepped in when ya did, I woulda got clapped."
Her eyebrows furrowed, but the disarming smile remained, as if she didn't understand his street lingo, but didn't want to seem rude.
"You are the first human to come here in a long time. Come! I will guide you through the catacombs. This way." Toriel stretched an arm in the direction of a dimly lit doorway. The youth stretched his legs and back before following her. He certainly didn't need a tour guide telling him what was up with this place. He already knew what was wrong: the population seemed to consist of murderous flowers and goats who treated him as if he was five years old.
After traversing up a staircase, the youth was directed to a room with raised platforms in the right side of the floor. Toriel stood with her hands folded, waiting patiently.
"Welcome to your new home, innocent one."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa, back up," protested the youth, shaking his hands in denial. First of all, I ain't in no way innocent. But he nixed saying that. "'New home?' You mistaken if you think I'mma stay here. If that flowa is an example of what otha people is like 'round here, I'm takin' the next train..." He stopped to consider his words. Strange environment, murderous creatures, a constant sense of danger...this place was just like home! And he had a clean slate here, which was more than what he could say for his life in the surface. The five-o should have been cracking down on his crimes by that point, and showing his face in the streets wouldn't do him any good. If he stayed here for a while and lost all the heat he got, and THEN got out, he may be able to run scot-free. A devilish smile played across his lips at his new master plan.
Meanwhile, Toriel raised an eyebrow in curiosity. "What is a train?"
Oh, heaven, have mercy...
"Uh...neva mind," said the youth, waving a hand dismissively. What she ain't know won't hurt 'er.
Toriel blinked at him before continuing on. "Allow me to educate you in the operation of the ruins." Soundin' real teacha-like. The goat lady walked on all but two platforms on the ground and pulled a switch near the exit. The double doors in front of them opened instantly. The youth noticed that the door had the same design as what was on Toriel's robe. Oh, naw, he abruptly thought. Don't tell me she part of a cult. It'd fit right in wit the rest a' the weirdos I seen 'round the city.
"The ruins are full of puzzles, ancient fusions and diversions between doorkeys. One must solve them to move from room to room. Please adjust yourself to the sight of them."
"Fan-freakin'-tastic. May as well dress me in an orange jumpsuit and gimme a strange-lookin' gun."
"Whatever do you mean?" asked the goat lady. The youth forgot that references to anything from the surface would have adverse effects when made to...whatever these creatures were.
"Jest thinkin' out loud," he explained quickly. She nodded in comprehension. As the two exited, the youth noticed a sign beside the doorway, which read, "Only the fearless may proceed. Brave ones, foolish ones. Both walk not the middle road." Yep. She in a cult.
In the next room, Toriel allowed him to pull a few switches in order to deactivate spikes blocking the next entrance. With an eyebrow raised in impatience, he turned to the goat lady.
"Splendid! I am proud of you, little one."
Somewhat offended, the youth retorted, "Come on, I ain't THAT li'l! I'm 15!"
She seemed to ignore his remark as she led him to the next room. The hall turned left, and there was a practice dummy standing in the middle of the room.
"As a human living in the underground, monsters may attack you."
"No kiddin'."
"You will need to be prepared for this situation."
"Uh, I know streetfightin'. Will that suffice?"
"No, no!" Toriel answered quickly. "That won't be necessary. When you encounter a monster, strike up a friendly conversation. Stall for time, and I will resolve the conflict. Practice talking to the dummy over here."
Did this goat lady fail a 730 test? The youth saw her and the training instrument there, but he was still trying to figure out which one was the dummy!
He approached the dummy pensively, trying to give Toriel time to say "I'm kidding!" But she merely stared at him expectantly, the warm smile still plastered on her countenance.
Friendly convasation, huh? May as well keep dis short.
"Wusgood?" he asked the dummy. In the back of his mind, he imagined the dummy suddenly sprouting eyes and launching a reprisal against non-dummies after a life of getting slapped around. But the youth had no such luck. The dummy remained inanimate, which was the only normal thing that had happened to him today.
Toriel, for some reason, looked extremely pleased with him. The youth felt as if he had done something right, but he couldn't really pinpoint what he did.
"Very good!" she commended. "You are very good." This left the youth perplexed. With every room they passed through, she only seemed to get crazier. The inundation of compliments and encouragement was also a bit of a culture shock.
When they entered the next room, Toriel went on to explain, "There is another puzzle in this room. I wonder if you can solve it."
"That's anotha thang. Why you got all deez puzzles lyin' around?"
She chuckled. "When the humans had banished us monsters, we first took refuge in the ruins. It wasn't much, but it was home for us. In fact, our king literally named the ruins 'Home.'"
A history lesson throughout this place? This ain't Uncharted, bruh.
"And the puzzles were meant ta keep people out?"
"Well, that was the theory he had put out. But, knowing him," Toriel's expression darkened slightly, "he did it on a whim."
Whoa. Touchy subject. Best not ta ask any furtha.
They progressed throughout the stony hallway, no sounds heard, save their footsteps and the hollow howl of air moving through the area. The youth jumped when he heard something similar to a frog's croak behind him. Toriel hadn't noticed anything and kept walking, while he stayed behind. Don't need no more monstas sneakin' up on me...
Leaping from the shadows was an overgrown frog, its eyes devoid of expression. The area around it and the youth darkened, just like in the encounter with Flowey, so that the frog was the youth's main focus.
However, this creature didn't seem to talk, which made it appear less threatening. Nevertheless, the youth was on his guard.
"Strike up a friendly convasation." Heh. Now I cain't pass a 730 test.
"Wus happenin', frog?" he said with a forced lopsided grin. The expression faded out after a while as he doubted the effectiveness of the amiable greeting. He wasn't this friendly in YEARS. In the city, friendliness would merely gain glances of suspicion rather than a reciprocated gesture.
Maybe he was certainly spiraling into insanity, but he noticed that the frog blinked thoughtfully at his response. It was obvious that it didn't speak, but could it understand him?
Just then, Toriel approached them and stared daggers into the frog, which froze in its place. It lowered its head and meekly shied away from the youth. This only raised more questions. Why was the frog so afraid of her? Did she have magic in her eyes that compelled opponents to flee? He'd be convinced of that; oldgirl was downright fearsome with that stare of hers.
I feel ya, frog dude.
The pair reached a corridor where a spiked bridge stood in the middle of a waterway. Now this seemed like a puzzle intended to keep people out, instead of waste their time. He stared at Toriel, expectant of an explanation.
"This is the puzzle, but..." She held out a hand. "Here, take my hand for a moment."
Repulsion etched across the youth's face, but he did it anyway. He figured that the goat lady could be trusted; she got him out of two potential scraps since his fall down here. But her continued babying was pushing him over the edge. If only the boys in the hood could see him now...Reluctantly, he grasped her wrist and looked away from her. His dark complexion concealed the blood rushing to his face.
Toriel led him throughout the puzzle, the spikes descending and clearing a path for them. She snaked left and right, which the youth figured was the specific pattern to take if one didn't want to get Swiss cheesed. He certainly wasn't complaining when they traversed the puzzle unscathed.
"Puzzles seem a little too dangerous for now," she commented before progressing.
"Cain't be any more dangerous than a talkin' flowa."
The hallway they were in now had nothing special about it; it was a lengthy passageway void of any special features, traps, or puzzles.
"You have done excellently thus far, my child. However..." a twinge of guilt manifest in her expression, "I have a difficult request to ask of you." She gulped. "I would like you to walk to the end of this room by yourself. Forgive me for this."
She about-faced and moved to the end of the hallway with daunting speed. In his years as a hooligan, the youth had never seen anybody run that fast, with or without cops chasing them. The most surprising thing about it was that she still looked as though she was walking in her usually calm manner. First fire magic, then a death stare, then powerwalking that would put fitness nuts to shame? This Toriel character was simply full of surprises.
But what was the point in leaving him here? Was this supposed to be a test? Real sus. Regardless, the youth began his long walk to the end. Nothing had caught his interest until he noticed a solitary white column on his left. He scowled at it; it was the only hiding place Toriel could have chosen inside that room.
"Gee, I wonda where she might be hidin'," he sarcastically muttered. Toriel's head poked from the side of the column until the rest of her emerged from it. "What was the point a' doin' that?" Never mind the quick speed at which she glided across the floor.
"It was a trust exercise, as well as an independence test. Now that I know you don't feel threatened when you're by yourself, I can attend to some business. Please remain here, for it is dangerous to explore alone."
Toriel turned toward the exit and suddenly stopped, as if she'd forgotten something. She patted the sides of her robe and pulled out a strange-looking object.
"I'll also provide you a cell phone, in case you need anything," she said, giving him the ancient device. On the surface, it had been a long time since phones with antennas were even used. It was more surprising that there was reception down here. "If you need anything, just call." Toriel turned toward the exit, stopped, and turned her head. "Be good, all right?" There was a slight reluctance in her tone and eyes before she left. The youth was left in silence.
So, she needed him to chill there while she ran some errands? He could do that. The area seemed devoid of monsters and traps. The serene silence should have stabilized his psyche with peace. However, all he felt was boredom and impatience, which allowed diverse scenarios to play in his head. For all he knew, the goat lady was on her way to get a bunch of other monsters to jump him. He'd be lying if he said he didn't trust the monster at all, but he was well aware that he'd only known her for around 15 minutes.
In fact, why did she save him? What good would it have done her? Sure, she painfully adhered to the "sticking up for the innocent child" shtick, but he knew nobody who would save a complete stranger. Things just didn't happen that way.
Where exactly was she taking him before she bounced? A stranger like her could have easily taken advantage of his unfamiliarity with the locale. Although he doubted it was possible, the goat lady could very well have been taking him to a place worse than one where he'd encounter "Flowey" again!
He'd concede that he was fronting like a mug throughout their entire exchange from the beginning. If she hadn't saved him, he wouldn't have given her a second thought and kept searching for a way out of here. He didn't know how to feel or show gratitude for someone who had saved his life. He'd figured that not giving her lip would be critical, even though he struggled in that department.
He couldn't place his finger on why he was so bothered that somebody acted so benevolently toward him. He'd guess that he just wasn't used to being saved by a tall, talking goat lady who had maternal attributes to which he was not accustomed. But no matter how much he'd tell himself that, there was another possibility looming in the recesses of his awareness. Could it be that he had recovered his long-absent-Nah, he denied, shaking his head. I done lost that a long time ago. Don't do nothin' but hold ya back.
The interim of nothingness held no benefits for the youth's calmness. He remembered what he had set out to do. "'Please remain here,' huh? How 'bout I don't?" He could do business all on his own, which he was more apt to address as "bidness." He shoved the phone in his lower pocket and marched through the doorway.
The new area immediately curved to the right, and a rather stoic-looking frog remained stationary near the left wall. It looked at him and paid him slight interest. A flood of relief coursed through the youth when he didn't see the area get dark around him again, which meant it didn't want beef. He froze up when he heard the phone ring not five seconds after he passed through the doorway. As expected, the ringtone sounded like a chiptune coming from his pocket.
Deciding it'd be best to answer, he picked it up and pressed the answer key. "Yeah."
"Hello? This is Toriel. You have not left the room, have you?" The youth hoped his gulp wasn't as audible on the other end. She knows somethin'. Might be anotha one a' them tests. "There are a few puzzles ahead that I have yet to explain. It would be dangerous to try to solve them yourself."
"Ain't you test my independence a minute ago?" he spoke without thinking.
There was a long silence.
"Be good, all right?" The phone clicked. The youth felt a twinge of guilt-Indigestion, he corrected himself, there was no reason for feel bad for anything-after hearing how the goat lady made that last request. Her voice had caught in her throat as if she knew something that he didn't.
After shoving the phone back in his pocket, he took another step before he was interrupted again. He heard a thoughtful croak on his left, coming from the large frog he noticed earlier. With the croak came a message that the youth could interpret telepathically.
"Excuse me, human. I have some advice for you about battling monsters." The phenomenon left him intrigued, and since the frog didn't try to kill him, he listened intently. "If you act a certain way or fight until you almost defeat them, they might not want to battle you anymore. If a monster does not want to fight you, please, use some mercy, human." The frog concluded its thoughts with a final croak.
He considered the frog's counsel. He was NOT going to take punishment from these monsters sitting down, you could trust THAT. But he didn't realize that monsters may either feel bad about pounding somebody or would know their own limits about their strength. If monsters could do that down here, what did that say about the humans up there?
But, he let his mind wander for too long and tried to shake the thoughts out of his head. There was simply no way he was developing a con...a con...The youth could barely think the word without feeling the urge to vomit. Jest slows ya down, he repeated to himself.
Ah, he found something with which to distract himself. A pile of leaves lay in front of him, looking as tempting as a plate full of gold. But while one appealed to his carnal, avaricious senses, the former connected to a long-abandoned youthful playfulness in his spirit. He looked around for any monsters who might be watching. He only found the wise frog who talked with him earlier. Ah, screw it.
With a bit of a running start, he dived into the leaves, crinkling them as he rolled around to lie on his back. He stared at the cement ceiling and grinned, his head resting on his hands. He'd heard of kids doing this in areas where people had lawns, but he had no such luxury. He didn't think he was missing much until he actually tried it. He crossed the activity off in his mental bucket list.
As well as a giddy childishness, he felt another emotion becoming dominant. All of a sudden, he made a conscious decision that he would reach his goal, whatever it was at this point, no matter the circumstances. No monster was going to deter him from doing what he needed to do. Though the sense of uncertainty became more manifest, which caused him to think of this sudden wave of emotion as blind ambition, he felt encouragement...no...determination.
He rose from the leaves, wondering what was special about them. His eyes widened when he discovered that there was a room behind the frog that talked to him earlier, the youth wondering how he could have missed it. He peeked inside and saw a bowl full of candy sitting atop a small white column.
It mus' be spiked wit somethin'. But if otha monstas come down here, why would they try ta poison themselves? He approached the bowl and read the sign underneath: "Take one." He didn't know if the candy'd be good, so he complied. He wasn't hungry just then, but he recalled how candy could be clutch if his blood sugar became low; he stuck the candy in his pocket.
After exiting, he tiptoed to a corner in the hallway, which curved left. He stopped at the corner and tentatively peeked around the corner. Another frog was hopping close by, its back facing him, but the youth held his breath. Of the two huge frogs he met underground, one of them was beefing, and the other gave advice. He was unsure which trait would be dominant in specimens yet to be encountered, so he took a few meticulous steps from the corner to see what happened.
The frog turned its head before squaring up (as well as a frog could do, at least) to him. The immediate area went dark around the youth once more. Ugh, not again, he thought before spacing his legs shoulder width apart and balling his fists.
The creature was in nowise menacing, and it didn't even reach the youth's knee. Fighting it wouldn't exactly have a purpose, would it? If anything, it'd be a waste of time.
"Look, I don't want no trouble," he said passively. Could it understand me? The frog, and-what was that creature standing under it?-blinked at the youth as if comprehending his relatively peaceful statement.
White flies sprung from the ground and reached to about his chest's height. It took him no time to discern them as projectiles coming for his soul. Better prepared, he weaved out of their path, and the flies passed by him harmlessly.
The projectiles were gone as quickly as they appeared. Impressed with his bullet-dodging skills, the youth's mouth pulled back in another lopsided grin. "Y'ain't hittin' me, homie."
What little drive to hurt the youth was absent in the frog's expression. Jest like that? All I gotta do is dodge they bullets, and they done wit me? This could be easia than I thought.
"We cool now?" he asked, unable to hide the surprise in his tone. The frog merely walked away from him. He raised a quizzical eyebrow. Was this frog going to let him pass without problems?
One step. Another step. The youth kept his eyes locked on the frog, which didn't turn back. He was over the threshold and into the next room without provoking any more attacks from the creature. He couldn't hold in his triumphant laugh when it was all clear.
The youth hopped over weak-looking flooring in the next hall and advanced to the next room. The floor ahead was filled with spikes, preceded by a boulder behind a platform. Test a' strength, maybe?
The chiptune tone emanated from his pocket again. He answered the phone.
"Hello? This is Toriel. For no reason in particular..." The youth could feel her eyes shifting left and right. "Which do you prefer? Cinnamon, or butterscotch?"
No reason, huh? Guess I'll play along.
"Uh, cinnamon."
"Oh, I see. Thank you very much!" she said cheerfully. The phone clicked. The youth didn't take two steps before the phone rang again.
"Hello? This is Toriel. You do not DISLIKE butterscotch, do you? I know what your preference is, but...would you turn up your nose if you found it on your plate?"
The way she treated such a trivial matter with such painstaking precision was actually charming to him. He chuckled, "It's whateva."
A pause. He forgot that she hadn't heard him laugh. "Right, right, I understand. Thank you for being patient, by the way." Click. Gulp.Why was it that he kept feeling...weird when Toriel reminded him of her request? He'd reminded her of his passing of the independence test. He'd made it obvious that he was out of the room, he thought. She didn't technically say to go back to that one room. As far as he was concerned, he was still all good. So why was he troubled to any degree?
He pushed the thoughts out of his mind and the boulder until it sat atop the platform, the spikes sinking back into the ground. As soon as he traversed over the line of spikes, he noticed his surroundings darken. A ghost with wings hovered in front of him, its eyes closed in what the human guessed was sorrow. Again, he didn't feel threatened by the monster, so he nixed fighting it.
What could he say to this monster? "Uh..."
It didn't concern him anymore when the ghost sobbed and flew away from him. 'Kay, guess I'll keep movin'.
He faced more weak flooring in the next room, which led him to walk lightly on the precarious ground. A heavy step caused the floor to give way, and the youth felt the sinking feeling in his stomach as he plunged to the level below. He felt his heart pounding against another pile of leaves. Unhurt, he dusted them off his clothes and ascended back to where he was.
After shooing away a ghost, witnessing a spider bake sale, and another call from Toriel, he met another frog, which stated that it saw Toriel around. Even more interesting was that it said everyone was too intimidated by her to talk to her. Maybe there's more ta dis goat lady than meets the eye. Betta watch myself. The youth figured he must have been close. He eventually saw a bare tree with all the leaves surrounding the trunk.
"Oh, dear, that took longer than I thought it would," he heard her say. She approached the tree and got out her phone, attempting to reach him before she saw him behind the tree. She approached him and searched him up and down for wounds he'd sustained since last they met.
"How did you get here, my child? Are you hurt?" The injuries he felt were minor, but nothing life-threatening. Not all monsters were as willing to let him walk freely as a depressed ghost or a frog. His bodycount (down here) was zero, which seemed necessary for survival down here. "There, there, I will heal you." She used a sort of green magic with her hands to close up the wounds caused by the underground monsters, but he gnashed his teeth when he recalled the scars from the monsters above the surface...
"I should not have left you alone like that," she said with resentment.
"Ay, but did I die, though?" He stared at her with a raised eyebrow.
"You could have," she whispered, then cleared her throat. "Anyway, I welcome you to my home."
Beyond the tree stood a tidy-looking small house that competed with the architecture of the surface. For living in underground ruins, the youth thought, Toriel was doing all right for herself. He followed her into the front door.
The first thing he noticed was the sweet, nostalgic scent emanating from his left. Now he knew why she asked about the cinnamon and butterscotch. He closed his eyes and took in the smell.
"Do you smell that?"
"Betta believe it," he grinned, a genuine smile this time. "I'm smellin' the cinnamon...but there's somethin' else in it..."
"Surprise! It is a butterscotch-cinnamon pie. I thought we might celebrate your arrival. I want you to have a nice time living here, so I'll hold off on snail pie for tonight."
Live here? Slow ya roll, lady. You merely gave me a place ta crash. Sure, the place was nice, and he had a means of sustenance, but this maternal monster would only cramp his style. If he did stay here, he predicted that there would be curfews, rules, and manners to which he had to adhere. Doing something like that would be like using his hands to stop a rushing river.
Also, snail pie?
"Here, I have another surprise for you." They began walking across the hall on the right. Toriel stopped in front of a closed bedroom door. "A room of your own. I hope you like it!" She rustled his hair as if to complete the parental archetype. The youth slowly tilted his head, squinting in disbelief.
Toriel jumped when she saw his reaction and said, "Is something burning? Um, make yourself at home!" She bounced, practically leaving tire marks on the wooden floor.
While she was gone, the youth investigated the rest of the hallway. The only object of interest was the large mirror on the end. He saw his somewhat slender, scowling face. Cynicism was embedded in his brown eyes, which snapped to the diagonal scar on his forehead. It possessed a dark red shade and was already beginning to scab over. Aside from that, he still looked very much normal.
For no reason at all, he smiled at his reflection. He looked even more intimidating with the forced smile than he did with the scowl.Such is the fate of a gangsta.
A yawn. A stretch. He checked the time on the cell phone. It was a couple of minutes past 1 A.M. He must not have been out for too long when he fell into this godforsaken underground, which explained his fatigue. Continuing onward out of the ruins would have to come later.
He opened the door to his new bedroom. It wasn't anything spectacular; it just had a standing closet (from which he snagged a backpack for later), a box full of kids' shoes, and a shelf with other miscellaneous items, along with the necessary bed. He took off his shoes, turned off the light, and lay on the bed facing upward, his head in his palms, and his gun under the pillow.
It was here when he was plagued with questions about the next day. Add that ta the list a' thangs I ain't used to. What would he see? Whom would he see? What would he have to do in the near future? Most importantly, when would he get out of here? The inquiries ran through his mind a mile a minute, but in place of anxiety, they filled him with a childish curiosity. When monsters weren't trying to kill him, the place wasn't so bad. At the very least, he'd have something to tell the boys back home.
I'mma be okay, he deduced before closing his eyes.
As soon as I finished watching all the playthroughs for Undertale, I knew I had to make something for that gem. I got the idea of what would happen if Frisk was a bit more vocal in his dealings with the monsters underground. Then I flipped it, and wondered how my dormant original character would react.
The story may seem a bit rushed in the latter half because I felt as though the story was moving too slowly. It's to be expected in a tutorial level of a game, but I feared that readers would lose interest.
Reviews and favorites are greatly appreciated!