Chapter Text
No one had ever believed in Roman. Not his parents, not his teachers, no one. But he didn’t need people to believe in him. At least that’s what he thought before his last assistant quit on him unexpectedly.
He’d been researching monsters his whole life. It was hard to find any evidence that they’d even existed but war doesn’t just happen. That’s what Roman told himself anyway. He just needed to find them. To study them. He needed to know once and for all.
When his last assistant handed him their letter of resignation, he didn’t know what to do. He had his nibling to take care of, but he couldn’t just stop his project. Frisk understood it quicker than he was expecting and even offered to help. Roman didn’t really think it was the best idea involving a teen in research this intense, but they involved themself anyway.
Eventually Frisk decided to go further. They were invested in this idea that monsters were real and alive. So reluctantly, Roman let Frisk go to Mt. Ebott. They carried a bag of supplies and a webcam.
———
“Frisk? Frisk? Wake up, Jesus, please wake up—”
“I’m not dead. That just hurt.” Frisk signed sassily while getting up from the floor. Their bones hurt and they were covered in yellow petals.
“You fell pretty hard. I did not account for how far the drop was.”
“Obviously. Where do I go now?”
Dr. Roman Perkins didn’t know. He didn’t think the expedition would get this far. So all he said was “Forward.”
And forward they went. The hall they happened to land in was dark, the only light coming from the hole in the ceiling where Frisk had fallen. They didn’t care, the way forward was much more interesting then the distance between them and the hole.
The door to the end of the hall was sealed shut by pure time and erosion. It took Frisk a couple forceful pushes to get it to fly open, causing the teen to stumble in the room. What they were met with was the weirdest sight they’d ever seen, and it was just going to get weirder.
“Is…is that a flower with a face?” Frisk nodded in response.
The flower smiled, waving Frisk over with a leaf. They walked over cautiously. “HOWDY, I'm Flowey! Flowey the flower!”
“You’re joking. It talked.”
The flower looked at Frisk with judgment. “You must be new to the Underground. Aren’t ya? Golly, you must be so confused.” The flower seemed to scowl at the teen slightly as they stepped closer. “Someone outta teach you how things work around here.” Flowey then cleared his throat. “I guess I will have to do.”
Immediately Frisk is pulled in, and with what seems like a flash of light, their soul is pulled forth from their body. They’d only ever seen it once. They got into a fight at school one day but it was different from this. This feeling was new. Like a call to the battleground instead of a random chance.
“You see that heart right there? That is your soul. The very culmination of your being.” Of course, frisk knew this already due to countless conversations on souls they’d had with Roman. “Your soul starts off weak but it can grow strong by gaining LV.”
This was new. It gave Frisk a slight feeling of Deja vu, but instead they rubbed the feeling off and looked to the webcam attached to their backpack.
“I bet you’re asking yourself what LV stands for. Well it stands for love, of course!” The flower smiled sarcastically, giving Frisk and the man behind the webcam an uncomfortable feeling. “You want some love don’t you?” Frisk shrugged slightly. “Don’t you worry! I will share some with you.”
Suddenly, the flower seemed to create several little floating rocks out of nowhere. “Those don’t seem very lovely.”
“Well, down here love is given by these little friendliness pellets. Go ahead, move around, catch them and you’ll see!” Frisk looked to their webcam for confidence and took a breath. In the name of science they would go. All for science. They stepped towards the pellets and plummeted to the ground immediately, in a pain induced fall.
“Frisk? Frisk?! You’re hurt—”
“You idiots. You absolute morons!” The flower laughed Maniacally. “In this world it’s kill or be killed! Why in the world would anyone pass up an opportunity like this?” Frisk's breathing quickened as they tried desperately to get up, but it was too late. They were surrounded by white bullets. “Die.” With that the circle of so called ‘friendliness pellets’ began to close in. They were going to die here.
Roman on the other side of the camera was panicked. This was his fault. He should have never said yes to their plan. It was a stupid mistake and it was always going to get them killed—
Frisk opened their eyes to a scream, realizing they were no longer surrounded. The flower had disappeared and in its place a tall goat-like woman stood. She seemed concerned. She kneeled down and held out her hand. “What a terrible creature. Torturing a poor innocent youth.” Reluctantly, frisk took her hand. “Do not be afraid, my child. I’m Toriel, caretaker of these ruins.” She helped the teen up, making sure they were stable before continuing her introduction. “I pass through here every day to make sure no one has fallen.”
“Thank you.” Frisk smiled, and managed to hear Roman’s gasp of relief through the camera's speaker.
“Of course. You are the first human to come down here in a very long time.” She held out her hand once more, like a Frisks mother would when they walked through the park. “Come now. I will guide you through the catacombs.” Frisk took her hand. “This way.”
She led frisk slowly through a door at the other side of the room. The following room was a bright purple with a double staircase at the end. In the middle of those staircases was what seemed like a star. At this point Toriel let go of their hand to let the teen examine the object.
“What is this Roman?”
Clacking from a keyboard could be heard before a response of, “I have no idea. It looks like a star. Maybe you shouldn’t touch it—”
“Too late.” Frisk had already been touching it for a few seconds before Roman noticed. When they focused on the star, they could feel something coursing through their veins. It was a willingness to keep going, even though they’d almost died some moments before. That feeling of determination rejuvenated them, practically curing them of all their wounds. Almost.
“How do you feel?”
Frisk smiled with a sigh. “Ready to keep going.” They walked towards Toriel, who was waiting by the door up the stairs. Entering the next room they were confronted with six pressure plates and a door that seemed sealed tight.
“Welcome to your new home, innocent one. Please, allow me to educate you on the operation of the ruins.” Toriel then proceeded to step very carefully on four of the pressure plates and flip the switch at the end of the room. The door rumbled open quickly. “These ruins are filled to the brim with puzzles, ancient but clever fusions of diversions and door keeps.” Toriel smiled softly and then continued her explanation. It seemed like it had been a very long time since she’d had to tell anyone this, but Frisk and Roman’s intrigue seemed to help her confidence. “If you are to travel to the next room, one would have to solve them. Please, try to adjust yourself to the sight of them.”
A slight giggle of discovery could be heard from Roman as frisk began to follow Toriel deeper and deeper into the ruins.
Toriel's instructions were easy to follow, she’d met many children before Frisk, making her the perfect teacher. To her this new child seemed smarter than the rest. It seemed like they were trying to understand how the puzzles worked, rather than just trying to solve them. When the pair came to the dummy room Frisk was skeptical.
Their first encounter with a monster was less than ideal. So the thought that they could simply just talk to a monster and not have to fight them was hard to grasp. It’s not like Frisk wanted to fight though, so they decided to give it a chance. When they walked towards the dummy they were immediately pulled in to fight like once before. Instead of being sassy or defensive, Frisk tried to start up a conversation.
It didn’t talk back of course. But the practice felt nice, and Toriel seemed to be very happy with Frisk’s attempt.
“Wonderful, my child! Now let us proceed.”
To the next room they went, where Frisks' next challenge was to try and befriend a frog? It seemed silly at first. But happy frisk complied with Toriel's previous statements. They decided to try and compliment the frog.
“I don’t think it understood the compliment, but it looks happy?”
“I’m surprised anyone has understood me besides you, Roman.”
On the side, Toriel cleared her throat, catching the attention of all three of the creatures in front of her. Awkwardly the frog hopped away, slightly embarrassed. “I can understand you just perfectly, my child. It’s almost like I heard your voice, but no sound.”
Frisk was quite confused at this but followed Toriel anyway to the next room. In that room, there was a floor covered in spikes, to deter invading creatures.
“This puzzle seems a bit too dangerous to throw upon you. Here, take my hand.” With practice, Toriel led Frisk along a forgettable path like she had done many times throughout her years. As they got to the end of the hall, the woman’s face began to grow slightly concerned. “You’ve done fantastic so far but I'm going to have to ask a difficult request from you.”
Frisk nodded
“I would like it if you could walk to the end of the room by yourself. Forgive me please.” With that Toriel walked quickly down the hall disappearing from sight.
Frisk began to cautiously walk to the end of the hall. What if it was all a trick? What if this is that flower's plan? What if—
“Do not fear child, I was merely behind this pillar the whole time.” Frisk gave a sigh of relief. “But that exercise was for a reason”, she sighed slightly. “You see I have some chores that need attending to, and you’ll need to be alone for a while. I will ask you to stay here, it’s dangerous to explore the ruins alone.” With that she turned and walked down the hallway in front of them.
She seemed to remember something and came back to the child for a moment. “Silly old me. I forgot to give you this!” Toriel revealed an ancient mobile phone, scuffed, and cracked. Surprisingly it still worked. “A cell phone. If you need anything you can just call me, sweetheart.” The goat woman then left without another word.
The phone was absolutely ancient. It didn’t have a texting feature, only a number pad and enter button that got stuck occasionally. Frisk put the phone in their pocket.
“You still with me, Roman?”
The voice on the other side of the camera seemed slightly far. “Yeah! Sorry, just writing all this down! This is so cool!” Frisk rolled their eyes at the response.
Despite the goat woman’s warnings, Frisk entered the room ahead. Immediately as they did so, they got a call on their new brick of a phone.
“My heavens! I really hope you have not left the room, I forgot to tell you about some of the puzzles located within the ruins. Some might be too dangerous but I trust you to stay where I left you. Be good, my child.” The woman then hung up.
Frisk giggled after hanging up the phone. This next room had another one of those glowing stars, and without hesitation they touched it. A surge of pure determination shot through them, urging them to keep going.
Room after room there were puzzles. Occasionally interrupted by the sweet calls of an old goat, and monsters trying their hardest to battle Frisk. Most of them were easily spared, until the human stumbled into a room with a ghost laying on the ground.
“Zzzzzzzzzzzz…zzzzzz…zzzzzz…are they gone yet?” The ghost before them was just saying the letter ‘z’ repeatedly, rather than pretending to snore.
Deciding that the only way to the other side of the room was to get the ghost to move, and not just stepping on him, Frisk tried to shoo it away. The ghost entered fight mode, but didn’t seem too enthusiastic.
“Um, what should I do? This is new..” Frisk seemed a bit hesitant.
“Try and cheer him on? He doesn’t look too happy to be here either.”
Frisk shrugged, giving the ghost a friendly but soft smile. The ghost seemed a bit more encouraged. No attack showed up, only a bit of text saying ‘really not feeling up to it right now. Sorry.’ Frisk seemed appreciative of the lack of attack. They decided to keep going and told the ghost a joke. This did not stop the next attack but it did improve the mood of the spirit.
For one last time frisk cheered the ghost on. It smiled. “I would like to show you something.” The ghost then formed a hat out of what would have been an attack. “Like to call it dapperblook, it’s like napstablook…but dapper…”
“Woah, that's so cool!” Napstablook blushed, ending the fight.
“Most of the time I come to the ruins because no one is here to bother me. But I met you today and…that was nice…oh goodness, I’m sorry…I’m rambling. I’ll move…” the ghost disappeared.
Frisk tried to wave Napstablook goodbye, but they were too slow. They set foot into the room in front of them. Two lonely spider webs sat by a sign. They seemed to be selling something. Frisk reached into their pockets taking out 7G. They didn’t really know monsters dropped money when spared but if they could give it back in some way they would. They left the coins on the web, in return getting a spider donut.
Off they went once again, a little grossed out by the donut but trying not to show it. Several puzzles later, and another interaction with their new ghost friend, Frisk found themselves in a room. The room was holding a single tree. Toriel began to ring Frisks' cell again, but soon realized they were right behind the tree.
“Oh dear! My child, how in the world did you get here? Are you okay?” The goat woman kissed Frisk's forehead. “I should have not left you alone for so long. That was very irresponsible of me.” Toriel stood up, gesturing for Frisk to follow her. “ I was trying to surprise you.”
Frisk followed, and touched the glowing star outside the woman’s home. All the wounds they’d suffered had healed immediately as they went inside.
“Surprise! I’ve made you a butterscotch and cinnamon pie. I wanted your first day here to be incredible. And maybe someday you can try my famous snail pie.”
Frisk tried not to make a face at the mention of a snail pie, instead focusing on the tiny home, and the smell of pastry.
Toriel then led Frisk to their new room. The room was fit for a child and not so much a teenager. But it was a sweet gesture anyway.
“I’m going to finish tidying up the place. Make yourself at home.” Closing the door behind her toriel left once more.
“This bed looks cozy.”
“You can sleep, kiddo. It’s okay. I think you’ve had enough adventuring for one day.” Romans voice was soft through the speaker. Frisk took off their gear, setting it down on the nightstand.
“You sure?”
“Goodnight, frisk.”
“Goodnight…”