Deafened

Chapter 1. A Frightening Encounter

A/N: Sorry this is so short, I wrote it in like, an hour haha. Also its kinda rushed oops.

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It was a quiet morning for you, sometimes you wondered if it was a loud place where you lived. Maybe people shouted at each other from across the street, perhaps music wandered through the sidewalks and creeped down alleyways, lightening the hearts of reckless, rebellious youth.

These were the usual thoughts that you encountered on these chilly mornings.

You zipped up your favourite navy blue jacket and pulled the hood over your head as a particularly cool breeze passed through you. It was the middle of Autumn and yet Winter seemed to have already washed through the dim city. The bursts of exciting reds and oranges, however, begged to differ.

You found yourself curiously looking around to see if anyone was walking along the street, perhaps walking slightly faster to avoid the undeniable rain, but nobody happened to come into sight. You supposed that because it was so early that no one should be out anyways, what may have been a sigh escaped your lips.

You made your way to the only job you had been able to get with your... disability? You weren't sure really, you had never really liked that word.

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Warmth greeted you as soon as you stepped into the somewhat rundown building. Well, of course it looked rundown from the outside, the interior was always a welcome surprise to any newcomers.

This was the place where you worked, it was the monster rights institution, you worked with the ambassador of all monsters. A little 9-year-old kid called Frisk who happened to be mute, you would frequently have silent conversations with them, speaking with hands. Luckily, most monsters seemed to understand sign language, no matter how bad your hands shook.

The entire city was mostly monster populated, in fact. You had always enjoyed lifting peoples spirits up, and helping them fight for their rights. You yourself currently lived with your girlfriend in a cosy apartment and she had learnt sign language just for you! She had worked really hard at it too, soon after you met she had started doing group lessons to learn it better. It had really worked; you two had frequent fast-paced conversations nowadays.

But now wasn't really the time to think about your sweet girlfriend, you had to get to work!

You greeted the front service water elemental; Aquamarine, complimenting her blue dress that seem to look like water itself. She gave a wave to you and wished you a good day, you returned the blessing; wishing her a wonderful day as well.

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You made it to your desk and sat down to get to work. Noticing the young ambassador from your peripheral vision; you invited them over.

They clambered up on to your lap and grabbed some coloured pencils from the desk drawer, neatly colouring in the colouring book you had bought them. You tapped away on the computer, finishing up some reports for your boss, who was actually the ambassador's adoptive mother.

They quietly wondered how things were going and you replied that things were going well and in fact, they were very close to getting monsters given equal rights to humans. You laughed when they jumped up in excitement and their head hit your chin. You decided it was time for lunch and headed to a café nearby with the energetic child. Texting your boss, Toriel, that you were taking Frisk to lunch.

You passed Aquamarine again, and let her know you were heading out for lunch. Quickly wrapping the ambassador's favourite red scarf around their neck so they wouldn't get cold.

You arrived at the café quickly, it was one of the places where you would go up to the counter and order. Then they'd give you a tray to take back to your table.

You and Frisk got a window seat, they looked at the menu and wrote down what they wanted, you did the same. You went up to the counter and ordered at the cash register, awkwardly signing that you were deaf, it was pretty much the only sign people knew.

The cashier seemed shocked, then wrote down the price and gave you a number, you payed and walked back to Frisk. You asked Frisk to let you know when the number gets called out.

Meanwhile, you both chatted about Toriel's infamous cooking, and how Dr. Alphys was making a breakthrough with a cure for cancer. It was something that humans would surely appreciate in the long run. Frisk looked over at the counter and that was your signal to get the food.

You briskly made your way to the cashier and gave her a thumbs up and a warm smile as a way to say thanks. She smiled back, and despite knowing you were deaf, said, "No problem." Anyways.

You grabbed the tray and turned your head to face her, to give her a last smile. She replied with a shocked face right as you smacked into something hard, spilling the food all over it. You fell back on to the floor as hot coffee and hot chocolate spilt all over you, burning your skin.

Tears pricked at the corners of your eyes and you looked up to see that you had crashed into an angry looking skeleton monster with a golden tooth and black jacket. He started yelling at you and you flinched back, despite not knowing what he was saying. Just from his movements you could tell he was infuriated with you, he had food falling from his jacket on to the floor.

You looked up in fear and shakily raised a hand to your ear, signing "deaf". He didn't seem to understand so you got up and tried your voice, unsure of how loud you were or even if the correct words were being said. Unfortunately, you couldn't lip-read spikey skeleton teeth.

You spoke shakily, "C-c-car..nn't-t-t, h-ha... hear." Your voice was so quiet that no one could hear it. But the skeleton must have, because he faltered immediately.

He stopped yelling and it seemed as if he didn't know what to do. You looked to the cashier and it seems your eyes showed it all because she immediately grabbed a wet cloth and passed it to you.

The skeleton was extremely still as you wiped the coffee and bits of bread crumbs off his jacket and face. You wrote down an apology, and gave him $20 to get his jacket dry-cleaned. You were still shaking violently and covered in burning coffee and hot chocolate.

People around you had been watching the whole encounter but at this point they turned away. Frisk seemed to have seen the whole endeavour because they rushed over. The skeleton seemed to be surprised to see the ambassador.

Frisk signed, "S a n s." Going over each letter.

You looked at him and signed, "You are S a n s?"

He ignored you and started talking to Frisk who signed back angrily. You saw Frisk mention that you were a monster rights activist at some point, and that you worked for Toriel.

He looked over at you in shock.

The pain of the burning hot drinks and that frightening encounter decided to come rushing back to you and your breathing quickened as you started crying.

You were having a panic attack.