...You know when you have those days that are going like absolute shit, and then all of sudden, the sun comes out, boss gives you a raise, and you win the lottery? Your mood rockets up to unachievable heights. And THEN, two minutes later, you find out your boss called the wrong person and meant to fire you for slacking, you read the number wrong on the lottery ticket, rain clouds flood in from all directions, and your girlfriend calls, says she was only dating you for money, and dumps you like the garbage you are?
Yeah. The moment my call with Toriel ended, it started to feel like one of those days.
This room was laid out in a simple enough puzzle, but one that looked agonizingly slow to complete. One pedestal to weigh down, one rock to push, a plaque that read "three out of four gray rocks recommend you push them," and a set of beloved spikes blocking my forward movement. I sighed and cracked my knuckles, ready to get this one over with.
The boulder was infinitely lighter than I expected; felt almost like Styrofoam, actually, but weighed down the pedestal regardless. With little effort, I'd solved the puzzle,and the spikes retracted with a sharp click. Onto the next room.
I breezed through the next one, too. I quickly spotted patches of stone with the same sag as the floor that had collapsed earlier under my feet sprawled all over the place, and this time the room was far too long to cross without taking the plunge. I willingly jumped in this time, and, sure enough, my fall was cushioned by the same crimson leaves as before, with a staircase nearby to make the climb back up.
Before I stupidly dashed up to make a second attempt, I caught a glimpse of yet another plaque reading, "please do not step on the leaves." After that hint, the puzzle was a breeze.
The crimson leaves lining the floor were set up in a pattern underneath the sagging ground from above. All I had to do was memorize the pattern, weave through the area above between the leaves below, and I was set.
I took each step carefully, making sure I was following the pattern exactly (which was a huge change of pace for me, by the way,) until I finally reached the other side.
Tori had been worrying way too much over me. This place was about as dangerous and difficult to navigate as an elementary school playscape. Sure, you occasionally fall and hurt yourself, like say, your fingers, as a random example, and since you have such a shit temper, you figure it's a good idea to start whining and complaining to whoever you talk to next, usually your instructor or teacher. Possibly of the goat variety.
I refocused myself for the new puzzle, which was just a rehash of the boulder puzzle with three times the rocks and pedestals. Thrilling, I know. What will these wacky monsters come up with next?
The first two boulders were the same as before, sliding into place without my effort on my part. However, the third one was a completely different story entirely.
I placed my hands along the sides, got into position, and shoved it forward.
"Ew, what's that sticky stuff on your fingers?" Came a low-pitched voice ringing off the walls.
I would've acted surprised and tried to locate the source of the sound, but I knew very well where it was coming from. When you've found enough talking flowers and goats, you sort of become numb to finding a talking boulder. The bizarreness of the Underground had already long run thin. And I'd rubbed the warm, sticky blood from my fingertips all along its surface.
"...If I called it 'soda,' would that make you feel better? I asked sheepishly. My fingers subconsciously searched it's surface for a mouth or face of some kind, but strangely found none. All I succeeded in was rubbing off even more blood on it. "Now, could you do me a favor and shut the hell up? I have somewhere to be." Without waiting for a response, I made a second attempt at moving the damn thing.
"Whoa there, pardner!" It yelled. The sound had no visible source that I could find. It just rumbled outward from the creature, filling the air loud enough to send pebbles tumbling across the floor. And to make me wish I had earplugs.
"Yeah?" I backed off, exerting an exaggerated sigh of defeat, realizing it was resisting all of my efforts to force it to move. Looks like I'd have to resort to using my natural charm in order to soothe the savage...rock.
Unfortunately, I'd been fresh out of natural charm for fourteen some odd years, which left me in a bit of an awkward position.
"First of all, who said you could push me around? And second of all, who said you could talk to me that way?"
I groaned so loudly it hurt the inside of my throat. "Look, I dunno dude, could you just move over so I can get the hell outta here?" I made it clear I wasn't in the mood to have an argument with something that shouldn't and clearly didn't have a brain.
...My natural charm, ladies and gents. Come back next week when I unintentionally convince Mt. Rushmore to commit suicide.
The rock hummed as if it were pondering my question, but I'm pretty sure it just noticed I was in a hurry and felt like wasting my time. "So you're ASKING me to move over? Alright, just for you, pumpkin," it said snootily, scooting itself over maybe an inch.
"Seriously, dude? Move the hell over!" I pleaded. Saying this thing didn't have a brain was clearly a mistake, as it knew exactly what it was doing. The bastard only spoke in that condescending tone you used to degrade the other person and melt their sanity from the inside.
Huh, so that's what it's like to talk to me. I almost felt sorry for Tori. "Hmmm? You want me to move some more?" it teased. I realized I'd been wrong about it sounding like me. Its tone was missing that sense of bitterness i typically used to put the other person down even further. Which somehow made it even more agitating.
"Yes, please." I hoped this thing knew that I was well above dropping to my knees and begging, or else we'd be here awhile.
"Alrighty, how's this?" I could imagine the smug look on its proverbial face as it slid in the complete wrong direction.
The only way I kept myself from tearing my own hair out was reminding myself I'd get bloodstains all over it. No, you are not letting a god damn boulder get the best of you. "You know, I was kind of hoping that you would slide over to the PEDESTAL, please?" I asked, trying and failing to keep the turbulence from seeping into my voice.
"Hmmmmmm? That was the wrong direction?"
"Yes!"
"HHHHHHHHHHHMMMMMMMMMM. Okay, I think I got it." It concluded. My heart leapt out of my god damn chest when the rock, at long last, slid itself over to the pedestal. The spikes sank into the ground almost immediately, like moles spotted by a chainsaw wielding badger.
"Finally!" I sighed, relieved to be free of its reign of sarcasm over me. Handling people just as frustrating as yourself was unspeakably irritating. It was like having an argument with yourself in the mirror. If your reflection happened be a rock, that is. Maybe it only bothered me 'cause I was on the losing end of the condescending battle, for once.
My sneakers squeaked to a halt under me as the spikes rocketed back up to full height inches from my toes. I gasped sharply and tumbled backwards, landing square on my ass. "What the hell was that about!?" I screamed accusatorily, whipping around to find what went wrong.
I cringed when my ears were assaulted by what I could only imagine was laughter, a horrendously ugly sound as if my good pal Rocky was gargling gravel. Sure enough, my dear, dear friend was cackling like a hyena, having moved a little ways off the pressure plate.
"Y-you wanted me to st-stay there!?" It asked in between laughs, literally shaking with amusement.
I felt the blood rush to my face. How in the hell did I allow this thing to get the better of me? At least Flowers are living, breathing things, but I just got played by something that used to be magma. And it burned. Badly.
"Are you trying to get me killed, you stupid, sedimentary son of a bitch?!" I yelled, already back up on the balls if my feet. "If so, I'd love to return the favor."
"Aw shucks, can't you surface dwellers take an itty-bitty joke?" Its laughter suffocated along with my patience. It seemed that it realized that I wasn't offering a hollow threat. "All right, all right, you can go on through, pumpkin," it promised. And this time, when it shuffled over and lay in the correct spot, removing the obstructions from my path, I felt confident it wouldn't make the mistake of moving again.
No matter how hard I didn't try, the scowl now seemed permanently stapled to my face. I was fooled again. AGAIN. Somehow I managed to not trust anyone, yet still slip into every trap and fall for every jape the monsters set out for me. Well, no more. I cleared the retracted spikes so quickly the rock physically couldn't have kept me there any longer, and I scurried forward like a rat.
A rat. That's what I was turning out to be. A pathetic waste of space who either mooched off others or was treated as a toy, a vessel for the monsters too experiment on as much they saw fit.
Brave ones, foolish ones, both walk not the middle road. Yep, that sure as hell was starting to sound familiar.
"Not again...never again."
I brought my focus back to the situation at hand, tired of wallowing in my own self-pity. Over one hurdle, on to the next. Move on. Never surrender. Insert some other bullshit encouragement line here.
If there was one good thing I could say about my situation, the ruins actually seemed to be getting progressively tidier and tidier the farther into them I explored. Fewer cracks populated the walls, the tiles didn't look like they were trying to escape anymore, and the vines were fewer and far between, plus they didn't seem hell-bent on suffocating the place anymore. It felt livelier, maybe less decayed and claustrophobic. Not so ruins-y, if that made any sense.
However, I think what really pulled it all together was the corpse lying on the ground.
I stopped just short of it, what I initially presumed to be a corpse surrounded by crimson leaves blocking my way forward. One double-take later and I realized that I had seriously jumped the gun in assuming it was a corpse. Not only was it breathing, which to my knowledge corpses typically didn't, but it wasn't even...tangible.
Huh. So apparently ghosts were real now, too. I guess I hadn't given those cheesy ghost hunting shows enough credit, because clearly they had a better understanding of the universe than any other person on the planet combined.
...And whoever did the Peanuts comics, because this ghost had that same lazy bed-sheet-over-the-head-with-eyeholes-cut-out Halloween costume look down to near perfection. Aside from the hazy white glow surrounding it, and the fact that the vivid red colors of the leaves were washing through its fog-like figure, I would've just assumed it was a fake.
"...So what's your deal?" I asked, leaning over to look it in the depressingly sullen eyes. "Are these horror movie rules where you're a dead guy, or is this Golden & Grey rules where you're your own creepy, horribly misunderstood species?" Then, with a smirk, added; "If it's Golden & Grey rules, don't think for a second I'll let you tag alone, capiche?"
The ghost responded with one of the most intelligent thoughts of our generation. "ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ..."
My face and entire sense of emotion went completely numb. "Come again?"
"ZZZZZZZZZZZZ," it said again, faster this time, slamming its eyes shut.
Was it honestly pretending to be asleep? By saying "Z" repeatedly until I went away?! Like, not even snoring, just...saying "Z" a bunch.
This was overloading my retardation sensors beyond comprehension. "Hey, dude, no offense, but your act couldn't fool a brain-dead toddler. I can literally see your mouth moving!" I hollered, jamming my finger against its face for good measure. Strangely it felt somewhat solid, almost like jello.
...Gross?
"ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ..."
I sighed and pointed over my shoulder, back the way I came. "Look, I just spent five hours arguing with Sir Rockington Esquire over there, and I could use a good punching bag. So if you don't wanna end up as a puddle of ectoplasma, I suggest you get the hell out of my way," I said coldly, brandishing the almighty stick. It wasn't an empty threat.
To my genuine surprise, the ghost actually cut it out and floated up to meet me head on. It came up about equal to my height, minus his lack of legs, although he did make up for it with his levitation powers.
Wow. A real ghost. I wasn't a fanatic about the paranormal or anything of the sort, but something about discovering a mythical being that only nutcases and that one weird uncle who was, "abducted by aliens when he was your age," believed in was kind of exhilarating. Especially for someone who had an affinity for proving people wrong and pissing them off 'till their heads exploded. It was that same feeling you got from correcting someone when they quote something wrong, only multiplied by a million. The only way it could be any cooler is if it didn't look like a drawing from the masterful hands of a five year old.
"F-fine," the ghost grumbled softly, with a hint of resentment to his ghastly voice. For whatever reason it had been lying in here in the first place, it certainly didn't seem happy I'd disturbed him.
"Great," I cheered, taking a swing at its head. It connected right beside his left eye, spurting out a...rather horrific squirting noise. Other than that, it had pretty much no effect whatsoever.
Duh, I chided, you just tried to bitch-slap a ghost upside the head with a stick. Pretty sure even Golden & Grey rules wouldn't have allowed that to work.
All I accomplished was forcing another exasperated breath to escape his mouth. "Look, I'm really not feeling up to it right now," he droned in a faint monotone voice, gaze drifting around the room to anything but me, bearing that same blank expression that I wore anytime I was dragged to church.
I pursed my lips. Usually I steered clear of the depressed sad saps as much as possible. When people go out of their way to make themselves as unapproachable as humanly possible, I figure it's best to honor that and leave them the hell alone. Or that's the excuse I gave, anyway.
But I couldn't just ignore this one, at least until I could get him to leave. "Well, someone woke up on the wrong side of the leaf pile this morning," I goaded. "Why not just let me through if you're not even gonna throw a punch?" I smiled to myself, realizing he didn't even have arms. Unintentional mocking of the disabled complete.
My new acquaintance reared his head back, then leaned forward to let out a deeper and even more exaggerated sigh right in my face. "Very funny. Do you know how many monsters would make fun of me for letting a human slip by without even attacking them?" he questioned accusatory, as if I should already know any better. Then, as if embarrassed for speaking up, added weakly; "They'd...uh...never let me hear the end of it..."
I frowned. Now that sounded all too familiar. Where I'd come from, anytime you so much as slipped up on pronouncing a damn vocabulary word in English class, you couldn't get enough crap for it until at least the next day, when some other idiot would make the same mistake. Apparently the monsters in the Ruins had the maturity level of aspiring high school drop outs. And judging by his attitude, this guy had seen his fair share of mocking.
I kicked around a few pebbles impatiently as I racked my brain for a quick solution. For such a pacifist, this guy sure was stubborn. Then came the easiest solution. "Alright, how about you attack me once, THEN let me through?" I proposed, snapping my fingers in an attempt to sell it better. It was stupidly simple, but probably the easiest way to get him outta my hair. "You don't look like a loser...as much, and I can go about ignoring you. It's really a win-win situation." Damn, I should become a door-to-door salesman, I'm positive I'd make a fortune.
He took a moment to consider my offer, bobbing up and down like a fishing lure as he thought it over. Eventually, he nodded. "Alright, here goes nothing…I guess."
I tried really hard to keep from laughing at the poor sap as he attacked me. I know he wanted nothing more than to get me out of his...um...gelatinous scalp, but when your attack is so pathetically sad it makes the mutant frogs look like Godzilla, you've officially reached new heights of pitiful. Like, Space Needle stacked on top of the Eiffel Tower heights.
His attack was literally crying on me.
I jumped back expecting an actual threat (don't ask where I got that idea from,) and nearly stumbled when I saw the oversized white teardrops come rocketing out of his eye socket like a series of wimpy torpedoes.
Apparently, Spooky over here was one of the most deviously efficient tacticians of our time, 'cause the second I let my guard down, a tear splashed against my forearm.
"Ah, SHIT!" I squealed, dropping my stick to the ground with a clatter while hopping around like a mad prospector in a western film. My attention was so focused on the festering red wound oozing and spreading out to conquer more and more of my skin I didn't even notice the ghost's look of complete and utter confusion.
"Uh...did I hurt y-"
"-Shit, shit, shit, shit shit shit shit!" God, it stung as if an army of killer bees had gathered to concentrate all their stingers on one spot. The pain was so excruciating I seemed to forget both what thinking was and how human speech patterns worked. Years of English class down the drain.
Somehow, while I was bumbling around like a chicken who'd lost its head, grown another one, and then immediately got it chopped off again, a voice rang through my head.
"If any harm comes your way, eat something. It should restore your well-being somewhat," Toriel's words of...wisdom(?)...ran through my head. Still sounded a little out-there, but I was willing to try anything to rid myself of this crap.
My hand, shaking violently, rummaged through my pocket until it grasped at a piece of monster candy. I fumbled with the wrapper, practically shoving the piece of edible garbage down my throat. It went down with truckloads less trouble, although I didn't exactly have a moment to determine whether the awful taste was growing on me or if I was delirious from the ever prominent flesh wound eating my arm.
I waited. And waited. And waited. And waited in god damn agony for something to happen for at least a full minute. Dammit Tori, I thought, quick to blame her for the unreliable advice.
Until the pain completely subsided.
It happened in the time it takes to blink an eye, so quickly I was sure I was imagining it. But, sure enough, when I grew the courage to look back at my arm, the patchy red skin was being glazed over at breakneck speeds. Looks as though Toriel had come through for me for the millionth time over in the span of a few hours. All of a sudden, the title of "Caretaker" was starting to make a lot more sense for her.
With that insanity over, I had a stable enough state of mind to look the ghost in the eye. "You have god damn acidic tears?"
Somehow, judging by the look in his eyes, I dropped his self esteem even lower. Natural charm.
"Uh...I-I guess so...I'm really sorry..." he whimpered. I assumed if he had cheeks, they'd have been blazing red.
Little did he know this was the first time in history I wasn't actually angry at someone for screwing up. "Don't be sorry, that was pretty awesome, dude," I praised, flashing him a grin.
A proud expression washed over his face as if I just told him he'd just saved the entire universe from destruction by the hands of our evil alien overlords. "Y-you mean it?" he asked cautiously, refusing to trust my praise, probably thinking I was joking.
Another first for me, because I actually wasn't. "No, seriously. Can't say I've met too many ghosts who could kill a man by crying on them. What's your name, anyways?"
He seemed hesitant to tell me, as if it were some big secret. Judging by his...you know, everything, it most likely was. Eventually, something crawled out of his mouth. "Na-Napstablook..." he muttered.
I nodded. Weirdest name I'd ever heard in my life, but I nodded. "Napstablook, what is that, Russian?" I asked jokingly.
"Uh...I'm not sure...maybe-"
"-I was kidding," I interrupted, holding my hand up to silence him. "Look, I have somewhere to be, but by the looks of it, I'll be stuck down here with you guys for awhile. So maybe I'll see ya around?" I offered a handshake, then remembered he didn't have arms. Again.
Napstablook nodded softly, thankfully not offended by the gesture."Yeah...maybe," he said, managing a half-smile. "I'll get out of your way."
I started past him, crinkling through the leaves as I went, occasionally having to stop and tear one from the bottom of my shoe, when he called after me again. "H-hey, if you...uh, liked the thing with the tears, I have...a trick I could show you."
I spun around, crossing my arms and giving him my, "I couldn't care less," face, even though I could, as a matter of fact, care less. "As long as it doesn't involve burning my ass off, shoot."
On cue, his all-powerful tears flowed out of his eyes, curving upward to float above his head. They piled on to one another, steadily forming a...thing, fitting around his noggin snugly like a hat.
My jaw nearly dropped when I realized he they were literally forming a hat. A top hat, to be exact, Abe Lincoln style, that seemed to lighten his mood. Coolest thing about it by far was the fact that it still had it's liquid properties, bobbing around like jello, bearing the same color and clearness as Napstablook's whole faded white body.
"I call it 'Dapper Blook,'" he said proudly, with a new aura of confidence surrounding his words. Granted, he still sounded about ten percent as confident as the average person, but it was a start.
"How the hell did you do that, Grey?" I sputtered, still indecisively flipping back and forth between the possibility that whether Napstablook had physic powers, or if his tears were just imbued with magic mumbo-jumbo. "That's really frigging cool."
"Oh gee, I thought you'd like it...and I'm not sure, I've kinda always been able to do that."
I shook my head. It wasn't worth trying to figure out how he did it; I'd end up giving myself a brain tumor before I could come to a logical conclusion. And since when was logic useful nowadays? "Well keep it up, Grey. You'll have to show me more tricks like that some other time." I turned to leave for the second time, half-hoping he opted to come with me.
The moment I disappeared behind I wall, I froze in my tracks as Napstablook's voice fluttered over to me, almost out of earshot. "Heh...Grey. Now I have two nicknames," he began, sounding pretty pleased by his standards.
Wait...Grey? Had I been calling him that?
"I usually come to the ruins because there's no one around..."
I leaned closer, fitting my ear against the wall, all of a sudden interested in his monologue. "...But today I met someone nice...and a human, no less..."
"Me, nice?" I whispered to no one but myself. Clearly, he was talking about someone else, anyone else. Probably one of the frogs hopping around here or something.
"Ugh, you're rambling again," he chastised himself. I glanced back to see if I could catch one last glimpse of him, but he already vanished, like fog chased away by sunlight.
I frowned. Did I just...befriend a ghost? And where the hell did he get the idea of me being 'nice' from! I smacked him with a stick, then proceeded to sneak in insults every few seconds, and we somehow left on good terms. Maybe his self esteem was so low he had reached rock bottom, able to tolerate even the biggest of assholes. But then, that wouldn't mean he would like me...
...Maybe he was desperate. Maybe I was a sort of last resort, so foreign and strange to him that nothing I could say could put him down any further. Maybe...
"Maybe you're reading way too far into it," I told myself. "Dude was lonely, you got along...alright. End of story." With that incredible vague closure, I trudged onward, the after-taste of the rancid candy randomly creeping back into my mouth. "Dammit..."