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A cooling wind wafted across a white painted stoop. Ed turned his head to catch it and grinned happily.
"The breeze feels good doesn't it?" A man replied over the soft sounds of the ocean nearby. Ed struggled to move his mouth. All that came out was a low "ou" sound. Disappointed Ed just nodded softly in response. The man closed his notebook placed a hand on the boy's head. "Don't force yourself to speak, I wasn't expecting an answer."
The front door creaked open behind them and out stood a tall man a few years older than Ed with deep indigo hair and a long face. He looked like he was frantic. "Hey old man, I finished assembling the new bed. Can I leave now?"
"Did you finish or are you just saying you finished?" The old man replied creaking his chair as he turned to the teen. He gave a mischievous smirk as he saw the indigo man's silver eyes twitch in annoyance.
"If you don't believe me see for yourself," The indigo man huffed pulling off his white "Dog" armband. "I'm out of here."
"Hot date Matsu-san?" The old man prodded pushing up his rose-tinted glasses. Ed giggled and added kissy noises. The indigo teen rolled his eyes and walked off. The man called out. "Same time tomorrow."
Matsu-san just waved halfheartedly and then he disappeared from view up the beach path.
"Community service is a wonderful thing," The old man cackled. With that the man returned to his reading. Minutes pass and the man finds something. "Hey, here's something we can look into." The man pointed to the next entry. The entry depicted the murder of a 7 year old child in a flower garden near the middle of South Market by an unclassified entity.
The entry read: "Anomalous Beast #4: The Palisade "Goatman"
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Ruins - Act 2
"No, no, where is it?" Frisk thought as they rustled through a big pile of red leaves. They were doing this for the last few minutes, each of them leaving an increased fear as they passed. "It- it shouldn't be this hard to find."
"Oh!" A voice called out in surprise. Frisk looked to where it came from and found that their savior was able to wake up Ed. And from the look of it the boy was jolted awake by the woman's appearance. The monster placed her hand on Ed's shoulder tenderly. "My apologies my child, I didn't mean to startle you."
The woman in question was an anthropomorphic lop-eared goat with snowy white fur, red eyes, and small horns. She wore a long purple robe with what looked like a shield on the front. The shield depicted a white circle with wings on the side above three triangles. 2 facing up and 1 facing down.
Ed's shock melted and he tilted his head to have it rest on the woman's hand. The woman started rubbing and Ed smiled in content. "Mmm. Your hand feels like fresh dryer lint."
Despite the oddity of his comment, Toriel smiled. There was an almost motherly warmth to it.
Ed rose his head. "Who are you?"
The woman rose up to her feet and gave a small bow. "I am Toriel, I'm the caretaker of these Ruins. And you are?"
"I'm Ed! Nice to mee- hello!" Ed tried to get up but his legs gave up on him. He landed back to a sitting position.
"Again my apologies Ed," Toriel knelt again with a concerned expression. "That miserable creature infused poison magic into those pellets. I was able to heal your injuries but it takes a little longer for my Ensuna to take effect. So please, don't force yourself to move if you're not able to."
Ed didn't understand much of what Toriel said but the way she said it made him feel at ease. He then noticed Frisk walking up to him.
"H-hey, are you alright Ed?" Frisk asked. They got their answer with another unexpected tackle.
"I'm sorry Frisk!" Ed yelled sadly embracing the younger child in his arms. His limp legs made him look like a seal. "I was in my happy place, lost in the void of my mind. I won't try to grab LOVE again."
"E-Ed!" Frisk squeaked out at the sudden forced exhale. "I-it's alright, y-you can let me go now."
"Such emotion," Toriel mused to herself. "Where you two friends for a long time Frisk?"
"Uh," Frisk stammered as Ed let them go. "A-actually we only met 10 minutes ago. I-I think."
"And we already had our first near-death experience together," Ed added with a sigh that seemed like he regarded it as a memory for a future scrapbook. "That's a new record in my book."
"Well-" Toriel interjected nervously. "Hopefully that won't happen anymore."
Frisk trembled slightly.
"My feet feel tingly," Ed commented raising his unibrow in surprise.
"Oh, can you move your toes?" Toriel asked. Ed tried and the prickly feeling rose up his legs. Ed flipped around and rubbed them and the feeling ebbed away. He looked to Toriel who smiled. "Here, let me help you up."
With little difficulty Ed was back on his feet again. He rose his arms triumphantly with a celebratory woo. Frisk and Toriel sniffed then scooted back from the boy.
His aura reminds me of Waterfall before the purification project. Toriel thought shuddering internally. Externally her smile didn't falter.
What did I get myself into? Frisk questioned to themselves.
Toriel looked up at the light reflecting off the lavender stone walls above them. "It's getting late," she commented heading off to the stairs on the side of the big leaf pile. "Come children, I will guide you through the catacombs."
"Lead the way Goatmom," Ed smiled.
Toriel stopped and turned. "W-what did you call me?"
Ed regretted saying what he did. "Oh sorry, is that racist?"
If there wasn't fur covering her face, the humans would of seen a small blush in the goat woman's cheeks. "Oh no no, I- just didn't expect you to call me mother," she regained her composure. "But if it makes you feel comfortable, you can call me whatever you like."
Frisk looked at the exchange with a sense of pure bewilderment. Nothing they remember from before is helping them now. First them being able to talk, then Flowey's poison, then the missing "shine" flowers, now this. Normally they would chalk one or two oddities as nothing major but at least they were able to see the shine flowers every single time. Frisk followed the other two with a sense of dread filling the pit of their stomach.
"The Ruins are full of puzzles," Toriel began as she showed the two humans 6 white floor buttons on the right side of the room beyond the doorway they just passed. "Ancient fusions of distractions and door keys. One must solve them to move from room to room. Please adjust yourself to the sight of them."
Ed wasted no time at all and walked on all six buttons. "Did I adjust good?" He asked excited.
"If you think you have it, pull the switch near the door Ed," Toriel motioned to a yellow lever in the front of the room.
Ed went up to the switch and pulled. The wall made a click and all the buttons Ed pressed came back up. Ed didn't see this however. "Puzzle vanquished!" Ed yelled running at the closed door nearby.
"Ed wait you didn't-" Toriel tried to stop the boy until-.
A loud crash shook the room as the stone door buckled against Ed's body. The door and the sides of the wall holding the door closed broke apart into fragments as Ed barreled through. A few moments later Ed called out from the next room. "Hey there's a creek here, can we go swimming?"
Frisk and Toriel may as well of been statues as they both were internally switching between dumbfounded awe and unrelenting terror. "H-hey T-toriel?" Frisk slowly asked.
"Yes Frisk?" Toriel shivered.
"I-i'm going to go into the corner and scream for a few minutes do you mind?"
"No, take all the time you need my child," Toriel stammered. Frisk slowly walked to the lower right corner. Toriel tried to take a step forward but then recoiled. "Actually Frisk, you don't mind me joining you do you?"
A few minutes later Ed returned to the room his clothes soaked from playing in the stream. "Hey guys, come on in the water's-"
"UWAAAAAAAAAH!" The monster and the child screamed wildly into their corner of the wall. They didn't hear Ed in their caterwauling.
"Oh, you're playing the screaming game. I'll give you your privacy then," Ed resolved returning to the stream.
He plopped himself back into the stream and lounged back. Closing his eyes, he hummed in relaxation. The cooling water of the stream and the calming sound of its babbling filled the Ed-boy with determination.
"Ribbit ribbit," A sound came out about 5 minutes into Ed's soak. Ed woke up to a rather large monochrome frog croaking at the end of the room. On the other side of a set of white spikes. Naturally curious Ed walked closer.
"Ribbit-Ribbit (Hello human, is everything all right?)" The frog's creaking slowly morphed into speech the closer Ed became. "(I hear screaming.)"
"Everything's fine, I was just adjusting to the puzzles," Ed smiled.
The frog turned its "head" to look past the boy. It made a brief survey of the heaps of rubble that where scattered throughout the room. Having an idea of what it was dealing with, the frog returned to Ed. "(I'll take your word for it. Does Ms. Toriel know you're here?)" There was some animosity in the frog's voice when it said Toriel.
"Oh yeah, there was something going on with my new friend so she's having a bonding moment with them now," Ed's smile didn't waver as he pointed to the hole.
The frog looked at the kid in a curious manner. It then replied, "(Again, I'll take your word for it, human.)" The frog started moving away.
"Hey wait! Don't go yet," Ed pleaded.
The frog turned. "(Yes? What is it?)"
"I need to adjust to the sight of more puzzles, can you help me?"
"(What? Why do you want my help?)"
Ed looked down. "I'm really hungry and I don't want to bother Toriel and Frisk from their mother and child time. And you seem like you would know this place enough to point me to food."
The frog hopped back to Ed. "(You are right on that, I've lived my whole life here. But that being said the only thing that's abundant here are spiders and Ruin Snails. And those snails are absolutely revolting to eat. And I would highly recommend not messing with the spiders.)"
"Why?" Ed asked.
"(They remember transgressions against them,)" The frog replied with a shiver. "(One of my brothers found that out the hard way. Rest his soul.)"
"I'm sorry," Ed knelt down to the frog's level.
"(Don't worry about it Human, we already made peace with what happened.)" The frog nodded. "(Now to address your hunger. The spiders are currently holding a bake sale for some reason or another further on, if you want something somewhat edible you may want to go there.)"
"I don't have any money though," Ed sulked.
"(If my smell is any indication, that will probably not be a problem soon,)" The frog gave a small creaky laugh.
Ed looked at the frog quizzically.
"(Just pass the puzzle and I'll explain,)" The frog hopped back. "(Or jump the spikes. I'm a Froggit, not a guard.)"
Since the spikes came up to half of Ed's shin. He decided to jump it. One of the white devils snagged his pants sleeve and he tripped and fell on his face. Otherwise he passed the spikes without getting skewered. The froggit laughed a little as Ed got up.
"(That's the spirit human,)" the froggit cheered.
"Row row fight the power," Ed gave a thumbs up and a grin.
The frogit stuck out its tongue "(The name's Vincent. But everyone calls me Vi)"
"I'm Ed," Ed grabbed the tongue and shook. "Everyone calls me Ed."
And with that Ed made a new friend, and a new problem for his new "Goatmom".