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Susie startled awake as she felt herself falling out of bed. She put a claw to her head and groaned as she pushed herself off of the ground. There were a lot of memories swirling around in her head that she didn't have yesterday.
Susie would almost call it another Deja-vu situation, but there was something very different about it this time. The girl took a moment to try and recall what had happened before she woke up. She sat on the ground in silence, mentally running through her memory, when she felt the world freeze around her in realization. She'd died.
Everything around her seemed to get darker with this realization. It took a moment before Susie realized she wasn't breathing right. The girl tried to gasp for air as those last agonizing moments played over and over in her head. If she thought too much about it, Susie swore she could still feel something lodged in her SOUL.
Susie clutched her shirt where the wound would've been, focussing on the texture and the very important lack of blood soaking the shirt as she finally managed to get control of her breathing. She didn't know what happened, but she's sure it wasn't just a dream. Nothing that felt even more real than Susie's memo-dreams could be brushed off as a simple nightmare, which begged the question, what caused it?
Going over the memory again was no help at all, until the girl started thinking about the way the flower talked, as if there were no consequences for its actions. Something about that itched at the back of her head. Right as Susie realized exactly what that feeling usually meant, she was, expectedly, thrown into a memo-dream.
something was very wrong here. Ever since they returned from that dark world, Kris has been acting weird, more so than usual. Instead of talking to the other townspeople as usual, they immediately ran off, stumbling as they went as if every step was a battle. When they return they tried to pretend nothing was off, but Susie could see the strain in their eyes whenever they moved.
They headed to the new convenience store, mostly because it was, well, convenient, and tried to pretend the owner wasn't dancing drunk with T̶̟̰̾ǫ̷̻̈̓̾̏ŕ̴̛̮̘̝̚͝i̵̤̐̿ḛ̵̓l̷̺͐̑̈́ last night. Kris went in alone, telling Susie to hold on for a moment. Apparently they wanted to surprise the girl with something.
Susie tried to keep herself entertained while she waited for her friend, but eventually boredom got the best of her, so she started walking around the store. While on her walk, Susie found this red, pulsing thing by the sewer grate. She reached out to pick it up, but before she could, Kris called out to her. “There you are!” they called from just around the corner. “I figured you probably wandered off while waiting for me, I'm glad I chose the” they cut themself off mid sentence, their red eyes widening so much they actually became visible from underneath their bangs. “Don't touch that!” Kris practically screamed at their friend, causing Susie to flinch back from the glowing heart.
Susie stumbled back a bit as Kris practically pushed them away to get to the heart. “K̶̮̒r̷i̸s̸?” Susie called out to her friend as they practically hunched over the pulsating thing. “Do you know what that is?” she asked them. The girl waited for a response for a moment, but when she realized she wasn't getting one, she started rambling to hide her worry. “I mean, at first I couldn't really see what it was, but when I got closer it looked almost like a SOUL? Like the one you had when we defeated the Titan in the church Dark world? But I mean, that's ridiculous right? It's not like you could live without a soul in your body, hah-” before Susie could say anything else, Kris cut her off.
“It is.” they told her, their voice taking on a raspy quality. “It is the SOUL from when we fought the Titan. But it's not my Soul.” Kris whirled around with an almost manic look in their eyes as they explained, the hand that was almost crushing the soul gesturing wildly as they did so for emphasis. “This thing has been controlling me for ages! Using my voice to talk, my body to ACT, Treating my Life like some kind of game!” Kris yelled out, underneath their bangs, Susie could see tears starting to form in their eyes. “This demon took everything from me as if we're all toys to play with and discard whenever it pleases!”
Kris was breathing heavily at this point. Susie saw the way they were struggling for a proper breath. She reached out with a trembling claw, trying to think of some way to help her friend, when someone shook her roughly by her shoulder.
Susie shook her head, trying to clear away the last lingering threads of the memo-dream. She blinked her eyes a few times, trying to take stock of her surroundings, when she noticed Gerson next to her, still slightly shaking her arm.
“There ya are Lass!” Gerson laughed, trying to cover the worry in his voice. “I noticed ye need ta leave soon ta catch up with Undyne, so I decided to come check on ye, only to find ya caught in yer own head again. Are ye feeling alright?” the old man asked, letting just a bit of concern slip into his voice.
Susie took a deep breath, trying to think of what to say, when the words were ripped from her throat without her say so. “I'm fine Old man. Just a nightmare that threw me into a memory.” something spoke, using her voice. “I'll be to meet up with Undyne once I get ready, Don't worry.”
Whatever stole her voice then proceeded to use her face to shoot Gerson a reassuring smile before shooing the old man out of the room. The thing walked Susie to her closet, before suddenly loosening its control, Urging Susie to pick an outfit.
As Susie started changing into the same outfit as yesterday, (today? Whatever) her mind kept wandering to one of the earliest memo-dreams she's had, one that, Susie was starting to realize, probably took place not long after the one she just had. One about a thing possessing her friend, and that demon warning her that it was kind compared to others with its abilities, that another being like it would be far more cruel. How it was Sorry that it was controlling Kris, but that if it left, something far more cruel could take its place.
Right now, as Susie sat on her bed, thinking about what could happen today, what did happen today, she couldn't help but wonder if that flower from yesterday was one of those worse things that the being in her memo-dream had warned about.
And as she absently rubbed her chest, trying to ease the pain emanating from the thing she can still vaguely feel lodged in her SOUL, Susie wondered where the thing that just took control of her fell on that spectrum.
⋮°˖✧ 𓆩✧𓆪 ✧˖°⋮
Undyne had set her alarm earlier than usual this morning. She had planned everything out so she could still get her morning workout in, and be in New Home on time to meet up with Susie to spend the day together.
Normally the duo would meet up closer to noon on Sundays, but today Undyne had a surprise planned for the girl. She was going to introduce Susie to four of her most trusted royal guards. And because of this plan, Undyne and Susie had agreed to meet up right after breakfast.
After getting home from her morning run, Undyne headed to the bathroom for a quick shower. She couldn't wait to wash all of this grime off of herself. Something had shifted during her run, and ever since then Undyne has felt as if someone dumped sludge on her or something. It was this wet, gritty texture all over her hands and arms that she just couldn't seem to shake no matter how many times she wiped her hands down.
Getting undressed, Undyne wasted no time in jumping underneath the hot shower, relishing at the feeling of water on her dry scales as sweat and dirt was washed away.
After enjoying the water for a bit, Undyne started scrubbing at her arms to rid herself of the discomfort that had been following her for most of the day. Despite her effort, the feeling of grainy mud underneath her scales just wouldn't go away.
Undyne was so focussed of trying to escape that awful sensation, that she didn't notice how rough she was scrubbing until the scales on her arms started flaking off into dust from it.
Feeling the spike of pain from the fallen scales, Undyne looked down to see what had happened. She stared down numbly at her dust, watching as it mixed with the water from the shower and slowly washed down the drain. She pressed her hand over the wound, feeling the same sludge texture that had haunted her for most of the morning. It felt as if someone had punched the air out of her lungs, as for just a moment, the grey dust sludge seemed to flash red.
Undyne stumbled out of the shower, claws shaking as she braced herself against the wall to try and fight off a full blown panic attack. Trying to recall some of the calming techniques Gerson had taught her, Undyne focussed on her breathing as she ran through a grounding exercise.
Five, four, three two, one. Sight touch, hearing, smell, taste. Easy enough.
Undyne could see herself in the mirror, the shower she should probably turn off, her sink, the bathroom tiles and a towel to dry herself off with.
Reaching for said towel to distract herself, Undyne moved on to touch. She could feel the fading sting from her injuries, don't think about it. she could feel her damp hair, the soft towel and the wall she'd braced herself with.
As her breathing started to even out again, Undyne moved onto hearing. She could hear the shower still running. She moved to turn it off as she kept listening. If she focussed she could hear the buzz from her fridge in the kitchen. And the sound of the shower stopping as she finally turned it off.
Not one to leave things unfinished, Undyne went through the last two senses. She could smell her soap and the scent of the water vapour, and could still vaguely taste toothpaste from when she'd brushed her teeth.
Now that she'd fully calmed down, Undyne couldn't help but be glad for how much she's studied grounding techniques. She might not have had any panic attacks for years before this, but they've been useful when hanging out with Alphys a few times, along with the rare moments she's had to console monsters during her official royal guard duties.
Undyne spent most of the rest of the morning pretending that weird episode hadn't happened, but when she met up with Susie, she did decide to keep an extra close eye on her as they travelled together, just in case.
At the edge of New Home, close to Asgore's castle is where Undyne and Susie were headed. It was a bit of a trek, and it would've gone much faster If Undyne had sprinted ahead like she'd originally planned, but Undyne couldn't bring herself to regret having Susie take the lead instead.
It was almost noon when the duo arrived at one of the royal guard training grounds. Undyne practically dragged Susie closer once she saw the four guards were already in the middle of a spar. It was 01 and 02, a rabbit and a salamander monster, versus 03 and 04, a mantis and a cat.
Seeing the 2 pairs face off against each other was always quite a sight to see. Both duo's were always incredibly in sync during battles, easily filling in wherever their partners needed them to. Seeing them spar like this made the battle almost look more like a dance.
Undyne glanced towards Susie, expecting to see awe and a childlike joy that she often spotted when kids snuck in to watch Royal guards train. But that wasn't what Susie was showing.
Sure, there was still a spark of awe in Susie's eyes, but she was incredibly focussed on the spar, studying it with such intensity that Undyne doubted she was actually enjoying this at all. Undyne considered saying something about it, but the spar was over before she could.
The fight ended in a draw, 04 holding 01 in a choke-hold while 02 managed to disarm 03, and currently had his sword to her throat. Both 02 and 04 released their opponents, the four guards checking each other over to make sure no one was seriously injured before heading over to greet their onlookers.
The guards checked in with Undyne first, before they turned their attention to Susie. They pushed at each other a bit, trying to be the first to introduce themselves, but one sharp look from Undyne quickly shut that down. In the end it was the rabbit guard that got to introduce himself first.
“Hey li'l dude!” he eagerly greeted the girl. “I'm Owen, but a lot of people call me 01 for simplicity.” the rabbit slung an arm over the salamander's shoulder. “This here is my buddy Otto! He also goes by 02 though.” said guard nodded his head in greeting before both were pushed aside by the Cat monster.
“Omg hii!” the cat monster called out, reminiscent of one of Alphys' dumpster diving acquaintances. “My name is Vera, also known as 04, and-” Before Vera could continue, the last unnamed guard shoved her aside, effectively cutting the cat monster off
“And I'm Lottie, although most just know me as 03” The Mantis introduced herself, glaring at her partner. “And as I've said multiple times, Vera,” she spat. “I can introduce myself just fine.”
At those words, Vera immediately turned to hiss at her partner, the duo quickly devolved into an argument as Undyne shook her head in disappointment. “honestly, what am I going to do with those two.”
Owen and Otto were already trying to interfere with their fellow guards' arguing, not that it ever really worked, so Undyne turned her attention to Susie.
The girl barely seemed aware if the shouting match that was happening right in front of her. Instead she was scanning the rest of the courtyard, trying to spot something, although Undyne couldn't for the life of her guess what it could be.
She was about to ask the girl what she was looking for, when Susie suddenly tackled her to the ground, just in time for her to keep Undyne from getting run through by a thorn whip.
Hearing the attack, the royal guard immediately snapped to attention, readying themselves for battle as a Flower popped out of the ground.
“Aw, too bad!” it called out, it's grin expressing the complete opposite from its words. “I was hoping I'd get to run Undyne through for a fourth time!”
The flower cackled with glee as it easily dodged the attack from 5 different guardsmen. “Oh well! Now I know how long it takes before you remember enough to change anything!” the flower launched a volley of pellets, easily knocking it's opponents down. “I should have expected as much from someone with as much determination as you, Susie.”
Flowey drew out Susie's name as a taunt, once again dodging a round of attacks before managing to land a fatal blow on Otto.
Vera cried out in anguish as she fell to her knees besides her partner's dust. Seeing another monster get callously killed like that enraged Susie to the point she managed to graze Flowey with a single hit, this action seemingly delighted the flower beyond belief.
The flower smiled as it spoke, although it was really more of a sneer. “Well, it seems I've done enough damage for this run, so I'll see you in the next one!” and with those words, Flowey once again disappeared into the ground.
Undyne punched the ground where the flower had been last. Dammit, that thing had killed one of her most loyal guards, and it got away with it without getting hit even once beforehand! Undyne got up from the ground and started making her way over to the rest of the guards, but before she could—
[FILE 2 LOADED]
Undyne stumbled as she tripped over nothing during her morning run. Strange, she suddenly felt unreasonably angry. The fish monster shook her head, trying to dispel the odd feeling as she continued on her jog. The feeling was probably nothing important.
⋮°˖✧ 𓆩✧𓆪 ✧˖°⋮
When Flowey first ran into that Susie girl, he was absolutely delighted to find something new and interesting. It only got better when the girl hit him with that magic wave of hers. It felt unlike anything he's ever experienced before! It almost reminded him of how it felt when you pass through a blue or orange attack, but not quite. there was something else to it, and Flowey didn't have any clue what it was!
But what might have been the best discovery was when he'd slashed Susie with his vines, only to find her bleeding.
There was only one monster he's ever seen bleed before, and that was that smiley trashbag. Flowey had tried to find out what was up with that when he first found out about it, but all he got out of that was the fact Alphys had found out about it at some point.
After a few dozen resets, Flowey had decided to box the bleeding in with all of the other Skeleton brothers' oddities. Things Flowey tried to figure out occasionally, only to give up when he got fed up with it, and eventually returned to when he got too bored.
Now that Flowey knew there was another monster that bleeds, he finally had a proper new lead for the 'what the hell is up with Sans and Papyrus' mystery. Susie bleeding gave Flowey many more questions and none of the answers, but most importantly it gave Flowey a chance to reconsider an option he'd previously dismissed.
When Flowey saw Sans bleed for the first time, he was way too shocked to do anything other than freeze. It happened before he learned to put off analysing new discoveries until after a save or a load, so of course Sans used the opportunity to blast Flowey back into last week. (Literally considering when his last save was.
After Flowey had a moment to process what he'd seen, he had immediately started theorizing about it. One of the first things he had considered was that the smiley trashbag somehow had so much Determination that it somehow clotted with his magic when he was hit, but that didn't match with Sans' behaviour between resets. Flowey got the chance to taste Sans' blood a few resets later, and it seemingly debunked that theory. Flowey had known what DETERMINATION tasted like since the moment he first woke up in this body, and Sans' blood only contained the fainest trace of it. It mostly tasted of ash, iron, and dead magic.
But when he'd tasted Susie's blood, the stuff was practically overflowing with Determination. It wasn't nearly as potent as the pure DT extract from Alphys' experiments, but it was pretty similar to the taste of the Amalgamations' goop, if he had to compare it to anything.
Knowing this opened up a lot of possibilities Flowey had preemptively dismissed early on. Maybe they were some kind of experiments someone performed, and Sans' determination had simply dissipated or something, or maybe the 'blood' allowed monsters to have more Determination without melting, but didn't require DT to sustain it or something!
After messing with Susie a bit to see just how well the DETERMINATION allowed her to remember LOADs and RESETs, Flowey decided the blood would be the first mystery he'd unravel.
It took just over a week before Flowey found a good opportunity for it, and a handful of resets before it actually worked out like he intended, but eventually Flowey managed to make Susie trip at just the right moment during her training with Undyne, so the fish monster would accidentally graze Susie.
The result was almost instantaneous. Susie got a small cut on her cheek that started bleeding, and Undyne rushed over to the girl in concern, before Susie had the chance to hide or heal the injury.
Undyne saw the blood and immediately started freaking out. Susie tried to calm her down by healing the wound, but that didn't help, and in the end Undyne decided to drag Susie over to Alphys' lab to get a 3rd opinion. Flowey followed them close behind, absolutely ecstatic to uncover this secret.
Flowey's excitement lasted right up until Susie and Undyne arrived at Alphys' lab, at which point Susie completely refused any and all tests that Alphys suggested they do. The most Susie agreed to was giving herself a small cut to show she did actually bleed, and it wasn't just Undyne imagining things. Flowey had a brief moment of renewed hope when Undyne told the girl they just wanted to make sure nothing was wrong, but that was quickly crushed when Alphys pulled out her phone to call Sans. That damned trashbag only gave a quick 'don't worry about it' over speaker before hanging up to do who knows what.
Alphys,being the coward that she was, immediately took Sans at his word, and Undyne naturally agreed with her without resistance, leaving Flowey without any answers.
Trying to burn off his frustrations, Flowey decided to dedicate a few more resets to pushing Susie to her limits. After a week of resetting, followed by a month of nothing to make sure Susie wouldn't break because of her DETERMINATION, Flowey decided to try a different approach. He'd try to befriend Susie.
One foolish mistake that the flower hadn't accounted for, was just how strongly the girl's memories would linger because of her determination. No matter what the flower tried, Susie would always avoid him, and even attack Flowey at the slightest provocation. The worst part was that for some reason the people around the girl seemed to pick up on her unreasonable tension, and even mimic it on occasion. When Flowey took a break from the Susie mystery to work on Papyrus again, the Skeleton seemed to become distant the moment he'd mention Flowey to Undyne, so now any future run involving papyrus would force him to swear the younger skeleton to secrecy to actually get anywhere. It was the most frustrating situation Flowey has encountered, and he can't even reset all the way back to fix it, because he has no clue when Susie actually appeared! It could be tied to that weird fun value thing for all he knew, and Flowey refused to risk losing Susie all together if he accidentally reset to a point before her appearance!
Lesson learned though, the next time a new face shows up in the underground, be sure to start with the cutesy friendshippy options before moving on to the actually fun experiments.
Taking his own advice, Flowey actually decided to leave Susie alone for a bit. Sure he'd keep an eye on her for a good opportunity to re-try befriending the girl, but until then he'd leave her alone to see if she'd turn down the paranoia a bit. Flowey had all the time in the underground, after all. waiting a few months to see the results of his experiments were commonplace, so how bad could it be to wait for this?
⋮°˖✧ 𓆩✧𓆪 ✧˖°⋮
It took over a year of waiting, but finally, his opportunity came a week after Susie's 13th birthday.
Flowey wasn't entirely sure what the deal was, but apparently Susie had gotten an Axe for her birthday (which would make fights against the girl so much more interesting in the future) but the old turtle was mad about the gift, and the fish was arguing about it already being delayed a year or something.
The important part is that after a week of disagreements, Susie had decided to run off on her own to try out the axe.
After messing around with it in one of the harder to reach grottos of waterfall, the girl ended up landing just a bit to hard on the edge of a cliff, which promptly crumbled out from under her, sending her falling to her doom.
Until a certain helpful flower decided to shoot out a vine and save her, that is.
Flowey carefully set the girl on the ground, and approached her with the best 'concerned citizen' look he could manage. “phew! That was quite the nasty fall there! Good thing I was around to catch you, huh?” Flowey smiled at Susie, trying his best to not be too off-putting.
Susie turned to the flower, hackles raised. But before she could lash out, something shifted in her eyes and she calmed down a bit. Must have been her coming down from the adrenaline rush.“yeah, it would have been a pain if you weren't there. Thanks for the save I guess.” she warily thanked the flower.
“It was no problem! I'm Flowey by the way! Flowey the flower!” Flowey introduced himself. The moment Susie gave her name in return, Flowey knew he finally had an in with the girl. “Well, it was nice to meet you Susie! I'll see you around!”
It isn't great that this happened right around the time Flowey had a breakthrough with Papyrus too, but luckily Flowey had a few save files at his disposal. Right now he'd focus on Susie, finally get some of the answers he so desperately wants, and later he'll just reset back to this point.
[FILE 1 SAVED]
Befriending Susie was… surprisingly not nearly as interesting as Flowey had hoped it'd be. She warmed up to him surprisingly quickly when you consider how wary she'd been at first, but that was mostly just a sign she was lonely.
She liked fighting a lot, trying out new magic and moves and stuff, which meant she sparred with Flowey pretty often, but that didn't teach the flower a lot. It did allow Flowey to discover that Susie called her weird magic Rude buster, that it was way more powerful when used by a magic axe, and that the weird feeling from the magic seemed to be linked to her heightened amount of DT. interesting to know, but not nearly as interesting of a mystery as he'd hoped.
There was a moment where Flowey thought he'd discover a new mystery when he saw Susie disassociate, but that hope was immediately crushed when Susie told him she had amnesia that caused those moments of her 'zoning out'.
Sure, trying to find out Susie's past could be interesting, but she was pretty open about what she did remember, which mostly just described absent parents that eventually left her completely, leading to her getting taken in by an orphanage and eventually the old Turtle. She also mentioned a few scars which convinced her the amnesia was trauma related or something, but all in all, there was nothing really exciting in Susie's past that he hadn't heard before.
Flowey might look into her amnesia someday, but after doing practically nothing fun in so long, it honestly just sounded like a drag right now. Maybe in the future, after he's had a bit of fun again.
Finally there was the mystery of Susie bleeding, which she still refused to look in to.
When prodding for an answer as to why Susie didn't want to know, she'd just shrugged and said hospitals scare her. Could be related to her amnesia, or just a childish fear.
Ugh, all of this has been such a waste of time! Whatever is going on with that girl seems to be just as much of a mystery to herself as it is to him!
If anything, there was one thing he'd get out of this endeavor, and that was the satisfaction of Susie's reaction when he finally got to stab her in the back. The wail of betrayal was like music to his ears as he watched the girl bleed out, begging the flower for a reason as she died.
There was something very cathartic about watching Susie turn to dust, it was such a treat after the dullness that was befriending the girl, that he almost didn't notice the black shard hidden in her dust.
Flowey looked into the shard, intrigued by its appearance. As the flower stared into the thing, for just a moment he saw a young adult version of himself Asriel, next to a human around the same age. The human turned to smile at Asriel and… that was Them, Chara!
Impulsively Flowey reached out to the crystal. The moment his vine touched the surface of the shard, everything around him shifted as he felt himself fall backwards into a void of darkness. The flower desperately reached for anything he could reach, when—!
[FILE 1 LOADED]
Flowey shook his head, trying to clear the odd fogginess of his mind after the abrupt reset. Odd, he hadn't meant to reset right after killing Susie, he wanted to see Gerson's reaction first! Flowey hadn't been born yet when he'd lost his first child, and his bond with Undyne never seemed quite as fatherly as it could be, so Susie's death might have gotten a reaction from him that he hasn't even seen when going on a genocide!
Oh well, that's something Flowey can do later. For now, he should focus on Papyrus. Flowey was pretty sure he'd had a breakthrough on that front.
⋮°˖✧ 𓆩✧𓆪 ✧˖°⋮
In a village at the foot of mt. Ebott, shadows gathered in the darkness of an abandoned shed. After almost three years the connection was finally strong enough again for it to reach through.
If anyone had looked in the shed in that moment, they would have seen darkness within darkness, but as it lay now, nothing was disturbed as the shadows once again pulled back to recover. All that was left behind by the darkness was a young passed out teen with red eyes and a blue and pink striped shawl draped over their shoulder.