interstellar5555 | Dance, Dance, REVOLUTION

Who: Frisk and OPEN
What: Come bother Frisk at work!
When: Saturday afternoon
Where: Pizza Planet

[A]

Pizza Planet is a big, kid-themed pizza chain, popular for birthday parties. The Vista City location where Frisk works is attached to the mall, and as such is particularly large and extravagant. There's singing animatronics, sure, but the main attraction is the games.

Frisk's job, today, is to restock all the machines with tickets. They're pretty small for a worker. If not for their employee uniform, complete with a little hat, they could easily blend in with the children shouting joyfully and running from game to game. But for the most part they ignore them, focusing on their work. As fun as that would be, making good friends with any kids from here would cause too many problems. They're not sure they could contain themself, if the topic of music ever came up...

They go quietly from machine to machine, opening up a panel on each with a key and loading in a new roll of tickets. Out on the game floor like this, it's not unusual to get approached by customers.

Honestly, it's not entirely unusual for Frisk to just hand some kids a few tickets here and there either. It's against the rules, but it's not like anyone notices. And it makes people so happy!

[B]

They get a break for lunch, but Frisk doesn't really need the full time. They're used to scarfing down their meals fast, and it's a habit that's never fully faded. So they can be found in their street clothes for part of the afternoon, playing Dance Dance Revolution alone in the corner.

As it happens, they are utterly killing it.

The easier songs have long since ceased to be fun, so now they're working their way down from the hardest options. Some kids stop to watch from time to time, but they're largely heedless of any silent onlookers. Their mind is elsewhere.

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Frisk shakes their head and listens to the explanation; they haven't played this one before. It doesn't look like as much fun to do alone, plus it's too loud. Draws a little too much attention.

They play rather like someone who has never played the game before. Their reflexes are obviously excellent, and they're extremely good at dodging the projectiles. They miss the boost, though, and seem like they're a little too focused on dodging to actually strike back at the enemies. Between that and the fact that they're not really one for talking, there's no way they'll win.

Losing doesn't surprise them much. They smile and flash Cloud a thumbs-up. Good job!

Cloud rams the bike home, and puts in another entry into the high score table. He sits back and enjoys the praise, but there's a disappointment to it. He had been secretly hoping he'd get beaten so he could go and do something else.

"You played well," he says, nodding, "thanks."

The kid doesn't seem to have recognised him, which is fine - no-one here has been recognising him, perhaps assuming that a rock star wouldn't be seen dead in a place like this - so he holds out a hand.

"I'm Clarence," he says, the name halting on his tongue as if it's a lie. He feels so much more like Cloud these days, but now that he knows it's not just a stage name, he wants to put a little distance between himself and that persona. Maybe it was time for an image reinvention. "What other games here do you need to be beaten at?"

Frisk nods and takes his hand. "Frisk." They recognize he's a musician, at least, but that doesn't mean much to them. At least, not in the way it might to a fan. It's good to meet more of them, though. If nobody came back for Clarence in particular, he'll need someone on the other side that he trusts, or at least recognizes.

Isn't his stage name something else? They wonder which is the right one.

Well, never mind that. They hesitate for a moment, then smile a little and gesture over towards the DDR machine. No one's beaten them on that yet...

"Frisk? Don't see a lot of Frisks around. Where are you from?" Cloud asks, finally peeling himself off the machine - the vinyl saddle sticking to his expensive leather trousers. He stretches his arms as he walks over to the machine with them, and takes off his sunglasses - that he's wearing indoors - to wipe away the sweat under his eyebrows. If Frisk's paying attention, they might notice his eyes are so ridiculously blue they cast a glow onto the white skin of his hands; so he replaces the glasses as soon as he can.

"I'll pay," he offers, because it seems polite, and takes his place at the machine with the graveness of a knight facing up an ancient beast. He offers Frisk a handful of coins. "Put it on Expert."

It was just dancing - how hard can that be?

Oh. Well, that's a thing.

They just shrug at the question. Will that be enough to put him off wondering where they came from? They should have looked at the geography of this planet a little better...not that it would matter if they met someone who'd been to whatever place they decided to lie about. Better to just start up the game and move on.

Frisk leans up to input the settings. They don't hesitate to select Expert, but they politely skip over a few of the songs they've done a million times. Let's try something a little less well-trod.

As the song starts though, it's obvious that Frisk is far more practiced at this game than the motorcycle one.

Cloud, feet on the top and bottom arrows and bobbing his knees in readiness, suddenly freezes in confusion before the river of arrows knocks him off-balance. He fumbles the first few bars, before realising that the arrow colour is different depending on what beat it's quantised onto, and rallies.

It's not an impressive performance, and he keeps looking up at Frisk in irritation that they're doing this to him, but considering he's a beginner, it could have been a lot worse. The slow tempo is helpful.

"It's not really dancing," he says, a little out-of-breath and trying to save face. "Not that I'm good at that either."

Oh, should they have explained this game a little first? He said to put it on Expert; they figured that meant he knew how to play it already.

Frisk isn't oblivious to his irritation, but they just shrug when it's over. It's a rhythm game.

Cloud shrugs back - his own trademark, full-body shrug - before nodding in agreement. It was.

"So is this your favourite kind of game, then?" he asks, worrying that he sounds awkward. He decides to try sharing a detail. "When I was your age, I used to want to be - "

- just like him, as strong as him -

He blinks, brushes hair out of his eyes, then begins his sentence again. "Sorry. I mean, when I was your age, I used to wish I was a hero from a role-playing game. Mysterious powers, lost memories - and beautiful music. Guess they've fallen out of fashion recently, but I played a lot of 'em growing up."

Frisk tilts their head slightly, staring up at him. Luckily, their poker face is quite good.

I think those are still around, they say, because it's far too much to tell him that he's essentially described his current life. If he hasn't realized that yet, he probably will soonish. But I like rhythm games better. I don't like games with fighting too much. There's an awful lot of monster-slaying in video games like that. It's a little too realistic.

Dance, Dance, REVOLUTION

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