Dad walked me back over to Mom's house soon after we finished breakfast.
"Be sure you mind your mother today, okay?"
"Yes sir."
"I'll see you later tonight." He said, smiling as he ruffling my hair.
I knocked on the door as Dad waited.
Mom answered a moment later; she looked tired.
"Oh, good morning Asriel. ...Morning, Dreemurr."
"Good Morning Toriel." Dad said, waving as he left.
"Well now; Are you ready to head off to school?"
I nodded.
She wrapped her hand around mine, and we started down the mountain.
"I am sure you will enjoy school. Dogi and Mika are enrolled there, as are a lot of other children I'm sure you'll be friends with."
She said as we passed by some houses.
"We shall have to take you to see the rest of the family as well." She smiled.
We finished our walk to the School, which looked nothing like I was expecting.
Frisk had talked to me about it a few times, but mostly in passing and complaints about jerky teachers.
It was... different than I had been expecting.
I had pictured something dark and gloomy, with high castle-y walls.
Instead, it looked like a big house.
Mom led me inside the big doors, into the enormous halls.
"I told Frisk's teachers yesterday that she would not be coming in today, and that you would be staying with me."
She said, smiling at me.
She led me to a room and invited me in.
It was about as big as the first room in the ruins, and the walls were lined with artwork.
"Any seat is fine Asriel." She said.
There was only one seat occupied, so I sat down near the front near Mom.
Mom sat down at her desk, pulling a few books out of her bag.
A few more kids trickled in slowly, eventually filling up most of the seats in the room.
"Good morning Children."
"Good morning Ms. Toriel." Everyone else piped.
"Does everyone have last week's homework?" Mom asked.
"Yes Ma'am."
"Yes Ms. Toriel."
Mom stood up and started heading to everyone's desks.
Everyone handed her a couple sheets of paper, except for one human girl.
Sheepishly, she raised her hands and apologized.
"My cat thought it was a toy, I guess. He shredded it." She said.
"Sounds like an excuse to me..." A boy next to her said quietly.
Without missing a beat, the girl reached into her bag and then placed a few shreds of paper down.
"Checkmate, Liam."
I looked around the room as Mom laughed.
All of the monster children were wearing striped shirts, but only a few of the humans were, which struck me as odd.
Maybe they were really small adults?
"Psst, hey."
I looked up as someone tapped on my shoulder.
"Hey kid; I don't think I've seen you here before. Is Ms. Toriel your mom?" The human boy asked.
"Yes."
"That must be rough, hehe. There's no chance you'd be able to put off any homework. I'm Josh, by the way." He said.
"Asriel." I replied.
"Cool. So if you're a goat monster, why don't you have horns?" He asked, looking away as Mom passed by.
"I'm... a kid?" I said, confused. My horns weren't likely to grow in for another few years.
"Kid, ha. Sorry, I just kinda assumed you were like, born with them or something?"
"Nope."
"Now, my children, who remembers where we left off?" Mom asked from her desk.
The day crawled by slowly.
The only constants in the room were me and Mom.
Some classes had a lot of monsters, but most of them had a lot of humans.
"Now, children, Who can tell me who Asmier the Just was?" She said, clapping her hands together.
The girl next to me shot her hand up.
"Asmier the Just was the fifth king in the Dreemurr Dynasty, and he was the guy in charge when The War broke out."
"Very good Valerie!"
Mom picked up her piece of chalk up and wrote "Asmier the Just – Fifth King of the Dreemurr Line" on the blackboard.
"Now, Asmier was the king in charge when the Humans declared war on the monsters. He had tried for as long as he could to keep the peace, but the Humans were determined to... send us away." Mom said.
"He was the first person on the front lines, and always the last one back.
He was called 'the Just' because he made his rules fair, and always took the time to ensure he knew everything about the trial he was judging. This earned him his name."
Someone behind me asked a question, but I wasn't really paying attention.
I'd heard this five times today, so I was just scribbling on a sheet of paper.
I doodled a stick-figure Undyne jabbing a wall, and my Mom and Dad holding hands in the corner.
"Because unfortunately Tia, my Ex-husband is very bad at naming things. Which is why our lands are currently called 'New Home'."
"Oh."
I added a doodle of what I thought my Grandpa could've looked like to my sheet.
"I talked with the principal, and we came up with a schedule for you. You can start it when ever you like."
"Thanks mom."
School had just let out; Mom had collected her stack of papers, and we were heading back to home.
"Yo, Ms. Toriel!"
Mom stopped as a Fish-Monster ran to catch up to us.
"Any sign of Frisk?" She asked, stopping in front of Mom.
I snuck behind Mom as I realized just who it was.
Undyne, captain of the royal guard, and one of my favorite people to torment when I had been a flower.
Mom sighed.
"I am afraid not. It is... concerning, to say the least. We are going to go looking for her again this afternoon. And, before I forget;"
Mom moved away from me and crouched down, setting her hand on my shoulder.
"Undyne, this is my son, Asriel."
"Alphys' mentioned something about that. Hey Asriel. You haven't seen Frisk around, have you? She's about yay high, brown hair, dorky smile?" Undyne asked.
I shook my head, scooting back behind Mom.
"I suppose it was a long shot."
"Anyhow... I am planning on heading out this afternoon to join the search. I would rather not take Asirel with me, as if there is something out there snatching children... Would you or Alphys be willing to watch him for the afternoon?"
"I'll have to ask Alphys, but I'm sure we could arrange something." She said.
"You have my number, so feel free to call at any time."
Undyne nodded before zipping away.
No sooner than we had gotten home than Mom's cell phone rang.
While she answered it, I went and set my sheets of paper on Frisk's desk before heading back out to the living room.
"Asriel, Alphys has agreed to watch you for the afternoon. I... would take you with me, but... I do not know what I would do if I lost you again..."
Mom whispered the last half, tucking her mouth behind the sleeve of her dress.
Taking a deep breath, she spoke again.
"Well, is there anything you would like to take to Undyne and Alphys' home? Perhaps some art supplies?"
She smiled.
"Frisk and I have built up quite a lot of them, in this drawer over here."
Clutching the pack of crayons, I waited as Mom knocked on Alphys' door.
It took a minute before anyone answered.
A very tired looking Alphys opened it, wearing a stained lab coat and holding a half-full mug of what smelled like coffee.
"O-oh! I w-was expecting s-someone e-else, sorry..." she laughed nervously.
"C-come o-on in! U-undyne's already left t-to go look for Frisk..."
"Thank you for watching Asriel on such short notice Alphys. I'm not sure what I would have done if you weren't available."
The two of them said goodbye, and then Alphys turned to me.
"W-well.. Is t-there something y-you'd like to do? Frisk h-has some g-games she keeps here..."
She said as she led me inside.
With a huge yawn, she set her coffee mug on a side table.
"t-there's been s-some late nights at the l-lab the past f-few days, so if sorry if I d-drift off..."
She said, rubbing the back of her neck.
"It's okay." I replied, setting my box of crayons on the table.
Her home was... mildly disorganized, with numerous knick-knacks littered around
"S-so uh... I d-don't t-think we've met b-before?"
"Uh... no. Nope. Never." I nervously picked at my shirt sleeve.
In this timeline we really hadn't for more than a fleeting moment.
"O-oh..."
Ahhh I'm sorry about this being so short y'all!
And about missing last week's update.
The Tl;dr version is that I had to give up my pupper and I was a shitty mess for the next week after.
I didn't really do much beyond drawing then :T
Anyway, this is really short bc if it wasn't it would be a whole other week for the chapter .w.
Reviews help me keep this story going! I really enjoy hearing feedback, and it makes me feel better about my writing in general.
you don't have to leave a review, but they do help~
Edit:: Added another section/