2Mushroom Dance
An Undertale genocide story
by Ringcaat
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Chapter 1: The Fragility of Interpretation
"Please! Stranger! I'll make this simple. I've spent my whole life in the same spot, in the same room. But I've long wondered what lies inside the room to the right. Long I've fantasized about entering, and changing my scenery... No... Changing my LIFE! Please. Go and tell me what's inside."
—Ficus guy in room_water_mushroom
Testing flag 84
"Whatever can it mean?"
Just like a good game could play out in many ways and a good friendship could endure plenty of different activities, the best questions were ones that could be taken in myriad ways, and answered likewise. Open-ended ones. Questions that brushed against those very qualities of thinking minds that made them special, unique, infinitely textured: the most valuable things in the universe. Interpretive questions. Questions of meaning.
"iT mEAnss... noe quaRtar will bb GIV'N to beTRaaeytrs!"
"Hmmm… it means that someone appreciates my muscles the way they ought to be appreciated. ; )"
"MEAN? It's meaningless. Meaningless! MEANINGLESS! There's nothing to it at ALL!"
"Wow… I don't know. Haha… maybe it means… that I'm gonna meet someone important soon? Like something big's in the air? Something like that?"
"I'm not quite sure, but I'll let you know the moment I find out, y'hear?"
The truth was... well, Ragel couldn't bring himself to admit, even to himself, that the dance meant nothing. But there was nothing inherent to the movements that gave it meaning. If it did mean something, that was only because the people who watched it chose to assign it meaning. Yet that was a meaning. Ragel didn't know quite how to articulate why it mattered, but that was his answer, and he was sticking to it.
It was his answer for himself, at least. For others, if they straight up asked what the dance meant, he tended to be evasive. He'd repeat the question, increasingly wide-eyed, and dance with increasingly wide motions. "Whatever can it mean? WHATEVER CAN IT MEAN?" Or he'd come back with his own question:
"What do you think it means?"
"When you came into this room, what did that mean?"
"Do you really think I'd just tell you?"
Or he'd inform the inquirant that if they traveled a long way further, and had a great number more experiences, they would eventually come to know the answer for themselves.
In a sense, that was true. Those who were insecure tended to read their own insecurities into the dance. But once they were secure in themselves, they realized the dance was empty—identical for everyone—and then because they knew it meant nothing, it did. It was elegant, and as far as multilayered riddles went, Ragel liked it.
Then again, he was pretty sure he'd only developed the dance shtick because of his own insecurity. But in a way, that was fitting too, right? It was all thematic.
He had plenty to be insecure about. He was a mushroom, an offshoot of a bigger organism under the ground, and as a result he couldn't move from his spot. He couldn't go and meet people, or see the world, or check out books from the library and learn. He didn't have much strength, or more than just the one special ability, unless common sense counted. And he was weak. Anyone could come step on him, or kick him over, and he'd be helpless to prevent it. That would be it for him. So if a sort of weird bravado was the only thing Ragel could cultivate to keep himself safe, he might as well cultivate it proudly.
Real strength was something nice, he gathered. He didn't need much, though. He could sustain himself on its shadow.
"It MeeAans... 3GG will be NATURAL DANC3R!"
"Waahaa! Well, I've got no idea what it means, but I'll wager if I need to know, you'll tell me!"
"Is it from a star? Can you make a wish on it? Will the wish come true?"
"Pff. It's pointless. It just means you like wiggling around. It definitely doesn't mean I've lived a life of sin! Because whenever I commit sins, I go for a forty mile uphill jog and BURN them off! Like fat, or calories!"
"Wosh mi SOUL."
The only reason common sense might count as a special ability had to do with where he lived. There'd been a time when Ragel had been alone. The occasional spider or snail or Kriket would wander by, and sometimes someone would even wander by he could actually talk to. Someone like a disembodied ghost, who had kind of the opposite problem as him. For his part, Ragel firmly believed that he'd be better off not stuck in a body, if it meant being able to move around. And the ghosts tended to think, for some reason, that he had the better end of the deal. But even if they couldn't agree, at least they gave conversation...
Most of the time, though, he'd been utterly alone. He didn't even remember how he'd learned to talk. He had a theory that it had come through his mycelium; that he'd been attached to a larger network of mushrooms once, long ago, and had absorbed information from them. Then, somehow, he'd been separated, and that event had woken him up. Suddenly he was his own person, with knowledge but no recollection of any of it.
It made a sort of deep sense. But at the same time, he suspected it wasn't true. He had no evidence for the theory, and it was a kind of wishful thinking. Lots of monsters were born already knowing things. Ragel had probably just grown this way.
But then, one day, a deluge of cacophonic vuvuzela music had arrived from the north, and in had marched an ebullient procession of... things. All disturbingly identical, yet in a way even more disturbingly different. The leader, in a three-cornered hat with bells, had raised an upside-down flag and smiled to the ceiling above, her shaking expression barely staying on her face. "I Nao Declaire This Villej... ANSESTREL TEM HAOMLAND!" And she'd plunged the flag into the ground so hard it quivered while all the other creatures like her bounced and flitted around. Two of them had extended their tails to impossible lengths and knotted them together triumphantly in mid-air. Ragel hadn't known there were creatures that could do that.
That was the start of Temmie Village. And that was how Ragel's common dose of common sense had become a special commodity. The Temmies liked asking him for advice, when they remembered he existed. Sometimes, it almost seemed like they understood it.
He'd asked them endless questions in turn, but he'd never quite been able to piece together where they'd come from or why they'd chosen this place for their apparently retroactive homeland. He just knew that the upside-down flag in the ground had been of an upside-down dragon, which meant it was, somewhat ironically, then right-side-up. The flag itself had decayed away into tatters that the Temmies ate, and the pole had sprouted into a little tree. But one Temmie in a wig had chopped it down one day, declaring that she "wood knot tell a (1) LAY/LIE." And that was the end of Ragel's hope for a constant rooted companion.
Not that trees could talk, of course. But it had added a certain gravitas to the village, just the same.
"It had better mean school is canceled. This weather is so humid it's ridiculous!"
"WHAT DOES IT MEAN, YOU ASK? CLEARLY IT MEANS YOU ARE AN ACCOMPLISHED DANCER OF THE HIGHEST TIER! I WOULD ASK YOU OUT ON A DATE, BUT THE PROBLEM IS... DATING REQUIRES GOING SOMEPLACE! ...I'M SO SORRY."
"Ah, what a beautiful dance. Maybe if I don't interpret it, I'll see it again."
"Oh, I know! It means I should go and eat at the MTT resort right away! ...They don't take reservations, do they?"
"...WACK. o/`"
The symphony of Tem snores was a testament to the diversity of life, whim and temperament. There were no two alike, though some fell into occasional counterpoint. There wasn't a moment's silence while the Temmies were sleeping. At first, it had been hellish, but by now Ragel was used to it. Some were like musical hiccups, rising or falling in triplets or heartbeat-like pairs. Some were sawblades or even chainsaws; others were airy whistles and wheezes, and then there were the contented rumbles. Ragel found it easiest, when listening to the Temmies snore, to wonder what was in their minds. It was so strange to listen to them express their thoughts—how many times stranger must it be to think their thoughts, and to realize, perhaps... That came from me! If one could grow within the mind of a Temmie, what would one witness? Translucent colored bangles dangling from arches and spurs everywhere? Windchimes sounding from cross angles? Blackboards filled with half-formed thoughts turning constantly, erasing like etch-a-sketches, sifting like hourglasses? He could accustom himself to listening to them snore, but how in the world did they accustom themselves to being themselves?
And what did they dream?
Night, of course, was only slightly darker than day, but this was much darker. It was a shadow. But Ragel wasn't afraid, because he knew the shapes of shadows instantly when they fell on him, and this one was familiar.
He turned slowly, not letting the sand of his thoughts drift too much. The skeleton was dressed in a suit jacket today, rather than his customary hoodie. He was staring at the painting of Tem history on the wall, as if he, alone out of all the people in the world, could make sense out of it.
"Hi, Sans."
"hey ragel. how's life treatin' ya?"
This question, so easy for some, was not easy for him. He'd found it was a challenge to translate the vicissitudes of his staid existence into something that mobile, active monsters could relate to. "I've been better," he said.
"yeah? i'm doing okay myself. mind if i hang out a while?"
He didn't mind. It was a great pleasure to have someone like Sans nearby. Which individuals happened to be nearby was one of the biggest changing factors in Ragel's life, and variety was the spice of life, according to people who spiced their meals. Sans was a quiet guy, willing to be perfectly silent if you asked him to be. He could be light and casual, or humorous, or profound, according to Ragel's whims. And he understood, as well as did anyone who could move, what it was like to be stationary. After Bob, Sans was Ragel's best friend.
"Make yourself at home. Slow night?"
Sans shrugged and yawned. Or did he just yawn dramatically? Either way, it looked like he might be here for a while. That was nice.
"Any news?" asked Ragel. He wanted to withhold his own news, so as not to seem frantic.
Sans lifted an elbow as if listening in one direction. He didn't have ears, but with his hands in his pockets, his elbows were something like antennae, so far as Ragel could tell. "they say mettaton's planning something huge for the season finale. something so big it'll change the show forever."
Changing a show forever. Ragel had to admit that was a lot more significant than just airing an exciting episode… but it still seemed pretentious to him. As if a television show changing were a momentous event… or as if something like that could last forever. "How about that. Any idea what it could be?"
"not really. but he's been visiting alphys a lot lately. whatever it is, she's probably helping cook it up."
"How long to the season finale? Three weeks?"
"little less than that, yeah. you wanna try and see it?"
Ragel had only once ever seen Mettaton's show. It was the only time he'd ever even watched television. Mettaton's cousin, Blooky, had brought it over for a friendship date, only to find that the Temmies had no reliable source of electricity. But a band of Shockras had been passing through the maze outside, and Blooky had somehow talked them into powering the set. Even so, it had been staticky and uneven, but it had made for one of the most memorable evenings of Ragel's life.
"That would be really special. Could you arrange it, somehow?"
Sans scratched his head. "not sure. depends on what my brother wants, i guess. he's gonna wanna watch the show and we've only got the one tv."
"Well, then." Ragel shrugged. "Let me know."
They were silent a while. That was fine. Ragel liked knowing he had a friend who was comfortable with long silences. Bob was the same way, even if his silences came from just forgetting what to say. Anyone too hungry for stimulation wouldn't get it from a mushroom, so silences were like a litmus test for Ragel's potential friends. Besides, the night seemed to call for silence, now and then. It wasn't that he didn't sleep, but he didn't need much of it. Sometimes he wished that he were built to sleep more than he was awake, because it wasn't like he could do all much with all his wakeful time.
But the other side of it was, if he wasn't able to accomplish much in an hour, then he at least had a lot of hours to do all his nothing in. In a way, it seemed like compensation. It seemed like life trying (though failing) to be only fair.
"mushroom dance, mushroom dance," said Sans, apropros of nothing.
It was a joke of theirs, as reliable as knock knock. But it was theirs, which made it special. "Whatever could it mean?" asked Ragel.
Sans looked meaningfully at him, letting his black holes for eyes do the speaking for a second. "it means you've got ants in your mushroom pants."
The absurdity of the rhyme built up in Ragel; he straightened in disbelief for a moment, then burst out snickering. "You're so silly."
"this coming from a guy who lives with temmies."
"They're naturally silly. You do it on purpose. That's something else. I like it."
"i meant it, though."
He meant it how? Ants? Ragel didn't wear pants, and there weren't any ants in Temmie Village—for some reason, they weren't attracted to flakes of colored paper. "How do you mean?"
"you want to go somewhere. get up and leave. go see a show when you want to see a show." A glint of white light came from one of Sans' eyes. "it's frustrating you, isn't it?"
It was hard to know how much to say. "It's more than frustration. It's a pain. It's always there."
"a pain. i see. you sure there's nothing we can do? no pot big enough for you?"
They'd discussed it before; he'd discussed it with Bob, too. "I'm a lot bigger than I look. I go down deep. Any pot big enough to hold me and feed me would be too big to move around."
"maybe not with a machine."
Ragel threw up his arms at distinctive angles. "Where would we get a machine that strong?"
"they've got machinery like that at the core."
"And someone at the Core is supposed to care that much about a little mushroom half the world away?"
Sans shrugged gently. "just saying."
"Just saying what?" Ragel struggled to keep his tone measured, not wanting to piss off one of his most valued friends. "That if we could manage to get someone with… authority at the Core to care about me, I might be able to move around in a giant pot pushed by some kind of forklift?"
Sans stared at him in silence for a long time. "yeah," he said at last.
Ragel sighed and let himself reabsorb his arms. He didn't say any more.
Sans stared at the picture again for a long few minutes. Finally, he shifted as if getting ready to leave. Okay, no. Ragel was frustrated, but wouldn't let this chance slip by. "Wait," he said.
The skeleton turned his head.
"I met someone," said Ragel in a serious tone. "Someone strange."
The inquisitive look intensified.
"A flower," he went on. "A talking flower."
Harshness suddenly dominated Sans' expression. Ragel wondered why. "a talking flower."
"A golden flower. With eyes and a mouth. We talked for a while."
Stillness. "huh. how about that."
"He teased me." Ragel let his cap sink. "He didn't seem nice at all. He acted nice at first, but it was all pretense. And he gave me spooky vibes. Real spooky."
Sans was clearly hit hard by this; Ragel didn't need an interpretative dance to see that. "where'd he come from? how'd he leave?"
Ragel grew an arm and gestured. "Right through the ground. The dirt parted for him and coalesced again. Parted and coalesced like magic."
"wow." Sans looked into the distance, to the west. "this flower—did he have a name?"
It was almost painful to say. "Flowey."
"flowey?" Sans made a face. "wonder who'd give him a name like that."
"I have no idea. He asked me if I was frustrated that I can't move, just like you did. He said he'd seen me dancing… he asked me what I thought I could accomplish with it." Ragel sighed, not wanting to revisit that conversation. "He asked me if I could really sense sin on people."
Sans stiffened and lifted his ribs. To his credit, he didn't say anything for a while.
"It was strange what he felt like. I didn't sense sin on him, not really. But it was… it was like sin wasn't far away. Like he was somehow carrying traces of sin with him, without having actually… " He shrugged. "Perpetrated it. I didn't know what to make of it."
"probably it's 'cause he didn't have a soul," said Sans.
Now that was a stunning idea. Did that explain it? How could anyone—? Well, it made sense, in a way. Napstablook's cousin Eustablook had suggested once that sins were a feature of people's souls, and yet… "No soul? How is that possible?"
"you ever hear of a flower with a soul?" asked Sans.
"No, but—I never heard of a flower who could talk, either!"
"of course not. talking mushroom, that's totally normal. talking flower?" He swept his hand over his head. "wheeoo. no putzing way. that's way out there, huh?"
Ragel's gills swelled. "I'm a heterotroph. Like you. I get my magic from decomposing tiny organisms in the soil, just like you get it from tomato paste and wheat and potatoes and sugar. Flowers are autotrophs. They feed off the sun."
"yeah. seems to me i remember you mentioning something like that."
"Fungi are closer relatives to you than plants. No monsters are plants—not even Vegetoids. You know that."
"yeah," said Sans. "that's what they say."
"Well." Then what was he? That was the natural question. But he knew Sans well enough to know he didn't have to ask it out loud.
"my brother's been palling around with him. i figured he was an imaginary friend. guess not."
Oh, that was funny. "He didn't seem very imaginary," Ragel suggested. "Palling around how?"
"that's what i'm gonna have to find out. this guy sounds like bad news. he say anything else?"
Ragel sighed, recalling. "He said I didn't seem very interesting."
Sans turned a little bit Ragel's way as if his elbows were doing the turning. "did it seem like he was trying to hurt your feelings?"
"No." Which was weird, now that he came to think of it. "It seemed more like he was disappointed."
"huh." Sans turned back to the carving of the dragon on the wall. "well, you do give off a pretty mysterious vibe when you're dancing. a fella might be disappointed when it turns you don't talk like that all the time."
"No one can do art all the time," Ragel pointed out.
And no one could come up with a good retort all the time, either. After standing in thought a while longer, Sans flicked a gesture toward Ragel with three fingers, a sloppy sendoff. "well, i'm gonna think this over. thanks for telling me, ragel. see you 'round.'
"So long," he replied, feebly waving a half-formed arm. "I hope you work it out."
Sans just walked away. There might have been a nod as he went. Ragel felt kind of dumb about his last comment. As if it were Sans' job to work out Ragel's encounters. Was there some reason Ragel couldn't work it out? There wasn't a lot he was able to do—thinking things through should have been right in his wheelhouse.
Compared to Sans, though, he didn't feel very smart.
He knew Sans wasn't doing it on purpose. He liked Sans. And he knew Sans liked him. But at times like these, Ragel felt frustratingly out of the loop.
A/N: At some point—maybe it was when I learned he had a name—I started to wonder about the mushroom guy in Undertale. What is it like to be him? What's the nature of his life? Really, you can wonder the same thing about countless absurd characters in Undertale or other video games. Perspective gives the world a tremendous extra dimension, so what are we to make of the perspective of a character who doesn't go anywhere, and whose narrative purpose is very narrow, albeit important? Understanding it might be like trying to view the world through a door left ajar. Yet in Undertale, pretty much everyone has a silly existence… so understanding comes more easily.
I've written three chapters of this story and I expect it to last… I don't know, maybe six or seven. (I have a history of wildly underestimating these things, though.) Since shortly after conceiving of the story, my plan was to post it if and when Deltarune's second chapter ever came out, in order to catch the attention of people whose interest in the franchise is newly revived. And behold! Deltarune Chapter 2 is here! I'm posting this twenty-four hours later, hoping that the folks who've wolfed down the game and are hungry for more will find a nourishing mineral or two back in the Underground.
As for me, I'm maybe halfway through Deltarune: A Cyber's World. Liking it so far! If you want Deltarune content, note that I wrote a bonus chapter for my Undertale novel, Alphys and the Queen, in which the title characters play Deltrune's first chapter. It's altogether possible I may write a follow-up in which they take the second chapter on!
If you read this story, please comment! Even if you don't like it. I'm a bit of a comment junkie and I often reply. :-)
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