There were many races of Monsters. While there were drastic changes among the races, it wasn't viewed any differently than racial differences among humans. The difference the monsters saw was the variety, as there were far more different types of monsters than humanity could ever aspire to. The Boss Monsters were of the highest order, and of specific breeds. Goat Monsters, or "Gavalitch", Fish Monsters, or "Faquant", and Skeleton Monsters, or "Svestipal", created a triumvirate for this specific label. The Spider Monsters, or "Alachtis", were once revered and respected across the land. They were once the most expansive race, and easily made up the bulk of military might for monsterkind. It wasn't until after the Great War that they, like many of the other breeds, were almost completely wiped out.
One branch of these races that often gets overlooked are the Elementals. Once upon a time, there used to be three of these. Fire Elementals "Brovol", Water Elementals "Bineev", and Life Elementals "Briche". They took the shape of their respective elements, and their lore and demise extends back much further than the history of man and monster—in fact, Elementals were possibly far older.
Elementals were often viewed differently than other monsters, not just in power and appearance, but in personality. It was a shared trait among monsters to love puzzles and brain activities, as well as naturally lean toward peace in comparison to the wrathful humans they shared the earth with, only the Faquant being a biological exception. Elementals were more human-like, though this attitude was usually directed toward one another. Endless wars were fought amongst themselves for hundreds of years, before one fateful battle it went too far. The ancient Fire Elementals wiped out the others entirely, or close to it, and once that was done… competition was gone, and they began to turn on one another.
Through centuries of conflict amongst themselves, younger generations were brought up to be more passive than their ancestors. It's due to this that the Fire Elementals didn't go extinct, as many expected them to. They bounced back from their status and reasserted themselves in the world. It was the Great War that brought them to their knees once again. Sealed underground, the Fire Elementals struggled to cling on, and eventually were boiled down to two families. The Fire Family, and the Flamesman Family.
Another thing that separated Elementals from other races was their reproductive cycle. Opposed to birth and mating, the Elementals were widely an asexual race. Gender was subjective and optional to them, much like the Ghost Monsters. While Ghost Monsters couldn't reproduce offspring, Elemental Monsters could. When one came of age, they could take some of their own life force and imbue it into a flame they separate from their bodies. The other elementals worked similarly to this.
It had become a tradition among the Fire family to follow a pattern. Children of a Fire Elemental were designed in the eyes of the parent. The color of the fire, the attitude of the child, right down to the preferred gender. That could be changed when the child came of age to have children of their own, but due to tradition, members of the family maintained their given roles.
Grillby Fire could still recall his childhood. He'd been raised by 'Maggie Fire', his mother, and his grandfather, 'Burnie Fire'. Fire Elementals were strange, when it came to age. They could live eternally, but when the time came to become a great grandparent… they would just flicker out and perish.
Fuku was 'born' the same day Burnie died. Maggie had started the bar & grill when Grillby had been a few years old. She'd named it after him, and raised him into it. Burnie hadn't been a man for this kind of work. He'd run the old inn before he sold it to the Bunnie family, only at Maggie's insistence. She loved Grillby's as much as she loved the real thing. She was a very passionate monster, and Grillby often aspired to her work ethic. His grandfather was incredibly lazy and apathetic, whereas his mother was consistently active and caring. He grew to somewhat be a combination of the two. He maintained her work ethic while gaining his grandfather's mostly uncaring, quiet attitude. Grillby kept to himself, a man of very few words. He only spoke when he absolutely needed to, not for any particular reason. He just found that people listened more to someone of few words than someone who blabbed all the time. Besides, talking was exhausting. He'd rather focus on work.
Maggie had a favorite shot glass. It looked just like all the others, but this one was special. The story behind it was a silly one. It had been about when she'd met the monster she'd fallen in love with, who just so happened to be the current head of the Royal Guard. Jariah Dhelaron. He stopped by from time to time to check up on her, a testament of their friendship beyond their teenage romance they'd once shared. The story went that Jariah had been wounded by a human, and during his rehab, he happened to cross paths with Maggie who had been moving about the underground in search of ways to advance her culinary career.
Their interactions were brief in the beginning, but soon enough they began to spend time together. Became friends, and romance even began to blossom. The shot glass came into play when she'd been working at a bar at the capital, and he'd come by to visit. Jariah Dhelaron was notoriously clumsy, so when he'd ordered a drink from her, he'd accidentally dropped it, and it somehow hadn't shattered.
That was it. The story was that he dropped a shot glass, and now she cherished it. A silly, pointless tale… but the underground was full of those.
Their relationship never actually went anywhere. After some time, they just decided to be friends, and that's how it remained. It wasn't until decades later when Grillby had been born did Jariah find his own wife from his own race, allowing him to continue the Dhelaron name.
Grillby's great grandmother was a woman he never knew. Apparently barely anybody knew her. She'd been known as 'Fire Fire'. Very original name, but she kept to herself. So private, in fact, that Burnie could barely even recall what his mother was like. She'd been a very old monster, apparently having been alive centuries longer than the old Gerson Boom. She'd had children before, but they'd all died without having ones of their own, and so on.
Her flame snuffed out the day Grillby was born. It was the way of Fire Elementals, but he often wondered about her. The tales she could have told. The things she remembered from a world nobody knew.
Grillby found himself often reminiscing. He'd been alive for eighty years now, still very young for one of his species. The day had come to continue their family through a daughter of his own, but… he couldn't. He didn't want to bring himself to snuffing out his grandfather yet. Maggie could understand this.
So Fuku wasn't born, not until decades after she was supposed to be. And when she was? Burnie faded away into the next life. The people of Snowdin liked him, so it was a somber few days after. He was the local grouch, sure, but in a strange, charming sense. The world felt just a little colder without him.
Maggie could be found wiping her favorite shot glass after. It soothed her. Calmed her down. It's how she dealt with her nerves, and kept on being happy for her customers. For their customers. Grillby was poised to take over the bar & grill soon, and they would both often discuss the newborn Fuku taking over for them in the future. It was a nice prospect. A family business. A family passion.
Like Burnie, Fuku was of an emerald flame. It went in a pattern like that. Red, green, and blue. Maggie was a deep azure of colors, and Fuku's child would most likely follow this process, unless of course she decided to do her own thing.
The cycle was broken, however. The Fallen Down disease swept its way through the underground. The first ever pathogen in recorded history to affect monsterkind. What was even stranger was the fact that it affected the elementals as well. Grillby and Fuku were spared, but Maggie? Her flames slowly started to die out as she fell into a comatose state. Grillby found himself unable to leave her side. Not at the hospital in the capital, nor in Alphys' lab. Due to a joint effort from Alphys and Fuku, they managed to get Grillby away. He got the news three days later.
His mother was dead.
He closed Grillby's and hid himself away within, the feeling of his whole world crumbling down beginning to suffocate him. This disease had affected far more than his family, but he didn't care. He'd lost his mother.
It was Fuku who stayed strong. She kept going to school, continued to maintain a social life… it was actually impressive to him in retrospect. She was strong, there was no doubting that. It wasn't until Grillby found his mother's favorite shot glass that he began to contemplate the future. He had to recover from his grief to move on. For not only himself, but Fuku as well.
He may have lost his parent, but she didn't need to. He took to using the shot glass just as his mother used to. When his mind was preoccupied, he would often take it and just wipe it mindlessly out. It helped him. It calmed him. It reminded him of his mother, and the love she used to share.
He missed her dearly, but he pushed on through the grief for his daughter. He re-opened Grillby's, and when he did, he made a friend in a skeleton named Sans, who'd just moved to town. Sans quickly became a regular, as well as a close friend to the Fire family. Grillby often found this was taken advantage of. Sans would have any of his purchases put on his tab, then never have the money to pay it off. He always had an excuse and a second chance, but one day he just started raking in cash, mentioning extra jobs. He seemed tired all the time, and when word spread about the lavish lifestyle Sans' younger brother, Papyrus, was leading, it became clear Sans' motivation had been Papyrus all along.
Sans was Grillby's best friend, and while Papyrus didn't much care for hanging out at the bar, he displayed a respect toward Grillby he often didn't show to others. Plus, he would offer to walk Fuku to school. She didn't find it necessary, but it was just that small of a comfort to her father.
Then… the world changed.
A human entered Snowdin one day, accompanied by Sans. He bought the kid some food, talked with her for a bit… nothing unusual. Grillby assumed Sans had caught the human while he was on watch, being a sentry and all. He had nothing to say, instead he simply watched and listened, wiping ceaselessly down his favorite shot glass.
Then they left. Sans came back. Everything seemed to be normal. Story was, the human was on her way to the capital. This stirred a commotion in the bar. That would make her the seventh human. The final SOUL to obtain. Excitement began to brew- though it seemed half-hearted. Many of the monsters shared their own experiences with this particular human. She'd befriended them.
As much as they wanted to return to the surface, nobody clearly wanted her to perish. From what he'd seen of her, he could understand. The human was kind, but they weren't all like that. Not many remembered what had happened to Jariah Dhelaron and the injury he'd suffered for his entire life before the Fallen Down disease claimed him. Not many remembered the world on the surface.
Then… the human returned. According to Sans, she was staying underground. Somehow, this caused even more of a stir among the residents of Snowdin. Never before had it actually been considered that a human would stay here. Grillby could recall his mother's story of one human that had nearly stayed, but that never actually happened.
And life continued like normal. The human, named Frisk, remained underground. She lived with them. Ate with them. Laughed with them. It was almost as though she belonged, she fit in like a glove.
Then there was that whole debacle with the CORE failing and Mt. Ebott erupting. Monsterkind had barely made it out of that.
Then they lived on the surface. Grillby opened up a new bar & grill to mixed success, but he quickly obtained new regulars. His competition was Muffet's, but she proposed to him a few times a joint restaurant- one that he rejected. It was a family business. Still, sometimes he wondered if he should have taken her up on that offer. Her restaurant was threatening to put him out of business without even trying to.
Muffet was strangely generous to him, and thanks to her, Grillby's managed to remain open. He could have sworn she was supposed to be stingy and greedy. Perhaps those were all lies? Who knew. Not him, certainly. He soon found out that his daughter had no desire to take over the family business after him. She wanted to become a marine biologist, which Grillby found absolutely absurd. A Fire Elemental studying sea life? He'd always known she'd loved the water and the creatures that inhabited it, but this felt too far to him. However, he could do nothing about it. It was ultimately her choice, and while it pained him, he knew that if she didn't want to resume the family business, then she didn't have to.
The sun had set an hour ago, now. Grillby found himself absentmindedly rubbing a rag through his mother's shot glass, thinking for a moment. His daughter was growing up. Too fast for his liking. He'd had to clean up and close the shop up that night, as she was off to Homecoming dance with her new boyfriend, Rian Dasterian. A human. Grillby wasn't… certain of how to feel about it. About their relationship. Was he supposed to just let it slide? It had been a thousand years since humans and monsters had mingled on the surface, and he didn't know what sort of customs had to be followed, if any. Were human-monster relationships even allowed? Maybe he was just being over-protective. Rian seemed like a decent enough kid, and he clearly liked Fuku and vice versa… Grillby just had to assume that Fuku wouldn't do as he had. He'd never been romantically involved with someone before. Never even considered it.
But hell, maybe it could be fun. If Fuku enjoyed it, then surely he could as well, right?
The television, which had been quietly playing an old program, suddenly flickered before showing a man's face. He had blonde hair, and a spruce mustache with a chiseled chin and thin glasses. This caught Grillby's attention, as it didn't fit the tone of the program he'd been watching at all.
Setting the shot glass aside, he grabbed a remote and turned the volume up. "-killed our standing mayor when he refused to grant Asgore his seat during a hostile takeover attempt. Humans, barricade your homes, stay inside, and wait for further instructions. As of now, Voxis City is under martial law. Acting against our police force will result in your immediate death. Tune into station 47.7 for further instructions. This message will repeat."
Grillby found himself rooted to the spot, staring with widening eyes at the screen as it went blank, before the man reappeared a moment later to deliver the same speech.
At that moment, a familiar face suddenly burst into the bar. It was Sadie, Rian's best friend. Her brown hair was splayed at odd angles, sweat clinging to her brow, her face red. She began to sputter out some words, most of which he didn't notice outside of 'daughter', 'attacked', and 'outside'.
He felt his fire run cold as he looked through the window outside to see two figures beside a dimly-lit emerald flame. Immediately, he hurried outside to approach his daughter, feeling his metaphysical insides tighten at the sight. She was unconscious, her body incredibly dim. Dangerously so. She was nearly dead.
Wasting no time at all, he dropped to a knee, placing a hand against her forehead. His body began to glow a bit brighter, transferring his heat and lifeforce into his daughter, who's color slowly began to return.
"Monster!" He suddenly heard, and looked up to see a group of people marching toward them, appearing intent on violence. He didn't have time to deal with this. He scooped Fuku into his arms, and without even moving a flame, a wall of fire erupted on either end of the street, allowing him a straight path to his bar.
Sadie said something, though he wasn't paying attention as he suddenly felt his legs wobble. Slowly, still holding his daughter, he leaned against the wall before sliding down, cradling her in his arms like he used to do after she'd been born.
He stared at her limp form for a moment, noticing that… it hadn't been water that had hurt her. It had been something else, something that was not a foil to fire. This terrified him. He removed his glasses to rub gently at his temple, wishing he had his mother's shot glass in that moment. Sadie continued to talk. Her voice was panicked, fast, and he didn't have the energy or will to deal with that right now. He just needed to take a breather and absorb all that had happened.
"I can't just wait around here, Grillby, I need-"
"Just wait," Grillby interrupted. His voice surprised her, and she stared at him for a moment, though remained silent.
That man on the television, now this, and how those humans had reacted to seeing him… something bad was going down in Voxis City, and he doubted nobody would come out of this unscathed—if they managed to survive.
His gaze returned to Fuku, and he rubbed a thumb against her dimly-lit cheek. Whatever came next wasn't going to be pretty, but… he'd do whatever he could to keep her safe. No matter what.