The Froggits seemed all too thrilled about the freedom that awaited them, and they were quick to flee the Ruins.
Ginger descended the stairs, and a wave of nostalgia washed over her. Even though she had technically only left this place a week ago, the sense of time having passed from her last Save made it seem like that much longer. Even still, from her perspective, it had only been several months, yet she felt like she was seeing the Ruins for the first time in many long years.
And then it dawned on her that, perhaps, this would be the last time she would ever see this place. Now that everyone was free to establish new lives on the surface, nobody would be coming back for it; it was sad, in a way, just like the old tree that grew outside of Toriel's old house. Those were to be left behind as well.
Up ahead was the little cavern she'd first found herself in. Nobody was probably going to be in there, but it wouldn't hurt to check, just to make sure no one got left behind during the departure.
Besides, she thought she might pay the little space below the hole in the earth a visit for old times sake, even if those times weren't all that old.
She passed the little patch of earth, and the bitter memory of her first encounter with Flowey came to mind. She hated him back then, but now it was hard not to want to find him, and to beg him to come back with her, just so he could spend his days in the sun instead of alone in the stuffy Underground.
After all, that was all Flow-no-Asriel had really wanted for everyone.
And she saw the very faint, soft light of the moon coming down from above, onto the patch of Golden Flowers and...
Her eyes widened, and she rubbed them to make sure they weren't deceiving her. When it turned out that they weren't, they grew even wider.
Was that...
Him?
It was a stark image of the deceased prince, who had only an hour or so ago sacrificed everything to save everyone. He was on his hands and knees, with his back facing her, carefully tending to the flowerbed.
"...Asriel?"
Ginger was so shocked, she almost breathed his name.
But the young Boss Monster still heard it, and he raised his head, then turned to face the human.
"G-ginger?" he stuttered. "What are you doing here? How'd you find me!?"
"I...wasn't trying to. I just decided to come here and see this place one last time, but...I wasn't expecting this."
She was in awe; he was still here.
"I thought you were..."
Asriel turned away again.
"Not yet. But...it won't be long now."
He plastered a fake smile on his face, then spoke in as cheery a voice as he could manage.
"I'll be okay down here. I promise. After all, someone needs to take care of the flowers."
"Are you sure you don't want to come up to the surface with us once you...? You know..." she questioned. There was no way she could empathize with what he was going through, but she at least had to try. "The sun really does feel wonderful."
"I can't go with you guys. I...I don't want to break their hearts all over again. It's better if they never see me. You go on ahead."
"...Asriel, I...I'm not going to leave you alone. You need someone, even if it's just for a little while..."
She sat down beside him, and the caprine monster did the same.
"Heh...Hey. Mind if I ask you something?" he piped up.
"Yeah?"
"Why exactly did you climb the mountain?"
"Well...not exactly climb. More like 'flew over to the opening to see what might be there.' I guess my curiosity got the better of me, though; ended up falling in."
"But didn't you hear of the legend? 'Travellers who climb Mt. Ebott are said to disappear."
"I did hear of it...but I didn't really believe it. But now that I'm here, and experienced this place for myself, and even lived to tell the tale, I'm actually kinda glad I did."
"Hm...I know why Chara climbed the mountain."
"Why did she?"
"It...wasn't for a very happy reason."
"You mean..."
"Ginger...I'm going to be honest with you. Chara hated humanity. But whenever we asked about it, she never told us why. One thing's for sure, though; she felt very strongly about that."
"Man...I'm sorry, Asriel, that...that must have been rough."
"You know something...you're really different from Chara, Ginger. Even if you two have kinda similar, uh...fashion choices...I don't know why I ever acted like you were the same person. I don't know why I did...a lot of the things I did, now that I have some sense knocked back into me."
Ginger didn't say anything, rather rested a hand on his shoulder.
"Maybe, the truth is...Chara...I loved her. We all did, but...she wasn't really the nicest person. But you? You're the type of friend I wish I always had. So maybe I was kinda, you know...projecting a little bit."
"Aw...Come on. I'm not that good a person."
"You say that, but I've seen almost everything since the beginning. I followed you as Flowey, just to see what you might do. You stayed with mom and gave her company for a little while, you gave Papyrus a new friend, you saved Alphys from jumping into the abyss, you spared Dad when you could have taken his soul to leave, you...you got rid of Flowey back in the last timeline...so he didn't hurt anymore people..."
"Asriel...none of that was your fault. The things you did as Flowey weren't your fault, and if I'd known who it really was back then, I...I never would have done what I did to you. Besides, like I said earlier, if I had no SOUL and nothing good to live for, I...would have done the same things eventually. And you and I both know this, since you and Sans could see other people's LOVE; in this timeline, your hands are cleaner than mine when it comes to violence, even if I didn't show it as much down here."
"B-but I...I pretty much killed everyone in the Underground when I absorbed all their SOULs."
"Maybe, but they were brought back..."
Ginger didn't care about secrecy anymore. She had to come clean with her origins. If there was one person she could tell...
"I've killed birds. A lot of birds for someone my age; my LV's at a good 5, you know that. It was that way when I first came down here. Even if it hasn't increased since my fall, and even if I was doing it to serve my people, I've still killed. And unlike your case, not all of the blood can be washed off my hands."
The prince seemed a bit perplexed.
"...Birds?"
"Asriel...I'm going to tell you something you might not believe. Before I came down here, I...wasn't what you see right now."
"What do you mean? You mean that being down here changed you?"
"Yeah, but...not in the way you're thinking. It didn't just change me inside, it changed my physically. I...I wasn't always a human, Asriel."
"...You weren't?"
"No. Before I came here, I was...well...a Barn Owl. Do you know what those are?"
"...My parents used to have a few books on surface wildlife...Aren't they the birds with the big, white faces shaped like hearts?"
"Yeah! Those. I, ah...was one of them. And my work force...The Tytonic Union of Pure Ones. They were mostly owls, too. Even the organization's name is derived from our species; Tytos, owls of the heart-shaped face. And we can all speak, just like you and the humans can. But we can never let anyone find out about that. Our civilization would never be the same."
"...Wow."
"You don't believe me, do you? It's alright; I didn't think you would anyway. I just had to get it off my chest."
"No, no. I do believe you, Ginger."
"Wait...you do?"
"Yeah."
"Why? I can't even prove anything here."
"I...can see it in your eyes. You're not lying. And you wouldn't lie about something like this, I know it."
Ginger smiled. She never thought anyone would understand, but he of all people did.
"Um...there's still one more thing I feel like I need to tell you about, Ginger, just to get it off my chest."
"Yeah?"
"When...when Chara and I combined our SOULs together, the control over the body was actually split between us. She was the one who picked up her own body. She was the one who carried it into the village. And she...she was the one who wanted us to...use our power against the humans. I was the one that resisted. I was the one that backed down. And...b-because of me, we..."
The young Boss Monster was on the verge of tears; no-one should have to recite the day of their own death word for word.
And Ginger wasn't far from the same herself.
She wrapped her arms around him, and he returned the favor.
"...And that's...that's how I ended up the way I did. And I blamed myself for that whole ordeal. That's part of the reason why I developed that horrible view of the world...'Kill or be killed.' But now that I've met you, I...I don't regret that decision anymore. I don't regret the fact that I resisted. I...I did the right thing. If I'd killed those humans, then... we would have had to wage war on them all over again. And knowing history, odds are we would have lost again. We probably would have ended up stuck back beneath here, or...or worse..."
Ginger let go, and gave him a reassuring nod.
"Besides...in the end, everyone went free anyways, right?"
"They did. All thanks to what you did back there."
"Yeah...I...I still feel kinda sad knowing how long it took, but...even if it wasn't the perfect method of doing it, you can't regret hard choices your entire life, can you?"
"No. You can't."
"Yeah...well...not that I have much of a life left, anyways...but that's besides the point."
"Asriel..."
"It's okay, Ginger...It really is."
"I'm...I'm so sorry this is happening."
"Hey. I got to feel this way again, so it's not as bad as you think. You know what they say; it's better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all...Though, I'm not exactly putting that in a romantic sense like most of them do."
Ginger let out a half-hearted chuckle; his remark would have been more amusing if not for the circumstances at hand.
"...Thank you for helping me feel this way again, Ginger. And thank you for listening to what I had to say."
"It...was the least I could do, Asriel. I know it might hurt later, but...just remember. We all love you, okay?"
"I know. And while I still can, I appreciate that you do...But be careful up there, in the outside world, okay? Despite what everyone here thinks, it's...not as nice up there as it is down here, you know?"
'Yeah. There are a few pretty nasty folks up there."
"And even after everything you did, I hate to say it, but...not everything can be resolved by just being nice. Just...Don't kill, and don't be killed, alright?"
"I'll...I'll take that to heart, Asriel, and everything I've ever done in this place, even if I can't always apply it. Besides...I can't go back to the Pure Ones. I figured out the hard way in the last timeline that I'm stuck like this. I'll be a human for the rest of my life...But that doesn't mean I'll go down with my past. There's a future to look forward to."
"That's the spirit, Ging'! You go out there and start something brand new! And...I appreciate that you came down here, so we could have this talk."
Asriel was silent for a few moments. The pins-and-needles sensation in his appendages was beginning to spread farther; the magic trying to hold his soulless body together was fading faster. It wouldn't be much longer.
"Well...It's almost it for me. Thanks again for coming to see me, but you should probably-"
"Oh! Hey! I just remembered!"
"What?"
Ginger fished into her pack and pulled something out; besides her small amount of gold remaining, it was the only thing she had left in there.
"Hey...You know something? I think that messenger bag used to be mine...Barely ever used it, though; I-I didn't like venturing outside our home that much. You go ahead and keep it."
"Well...It has served me good. Thanks for that. Just...lemme get something here real quick..."
"What do you have there, Ging'?"
"I, ah...found this at New Home. I figured it must have belonged to you, so...I might as well return it while you're still here."
She placed the object into the Boss Monster's furry white hand, and his eyes widened.
"This...this is her..."
"Oh, it's Chara's? Not yours?"
"Y-yeah. I...I gave this to her about a month after she fell down the mountain."
"Really?"
"You...you don't know how much this means to me. This is all that's left of her, and...I have her back now."
Tears began to roll down Asriel's face, and he clutched the locket in his hands as though he was holding his departed sibling herself.
"Thank you...You've done so much for me. For everyone. Thank you, Ginger. Thank you, thank you, thank you so much..."
He held it so tightly, he could feel the pulse of his own hands throbbing...even from the outside.
...Wait...
Was that his hands that were throbbing, or was that...
He loosened his grip on the locket and held it in his now open palm. His hands stopped throbbing, but...
The locket didn't. It was beating like the heart it was shaped after.
"What's the matter?" Ginger inquired, seeing the confused look on his face.
"It's...it's beating...It's so weird."
"I'M not the only one who thought it was doing that?"
"N-no. It's actually..."
And the beating began to intensify, almost as though something was trying to escape it.
"What do you think's causing that?" Ginger questioned, dumbfounded as to what the cause may be.
"Here, lemme open it and see."
Asriel picked open the snap lock holding the metal heart together, and it burst open. And, in a bright flash of white light, something emerged. The two children blinked their startled eyes, then adjusted them to the white glow that seemed to be filling the entire room to see what was before them.
There, floating right before their eyes, was what looked like a white, upside-down heart, that seemed to shudder ever so slightly as it stood there.
"It...it can't be..."
And that was when Ginger realized.
"Asriel...Is...is that your..."
"My...SOUL?"
And in an instant, the white light grew brighter, and the monster SOUL darted into its owner's chest, where it belonged. The white light faded, leaving the the two of them awestruck.
"I...I don't believe it." Asriel whispered.
"Asriel...I read something about SOUL vessels in the True Lab. Do you think your SOUL embedded itself in there before it could shatter and used it as a vessel?"
"It...I..."
He was hyperventilating. Clearly, he hadn't been expecting this to happen. Nobody had been.
"I...guess that's the case...I...I have my SOUL back. I'm...I'm not going to turn back into-"
"YOU'RE STAYING!"
Ginger flung her arms around him again, and the two children laughed. It was incredible. He was going to retain himself...
...Or was he?
The pins-and-needles in his appendages had ceased, but a new sensation had made itself present; he felt unnaturally heavy, as though something inside of him was weighing him down. Asriel's huge smile began to falter, and he remembered something. Something important.
And it nearly broke his heart all over again knowing it.
"But...I still can't come back with you."
"Whah...what?"
Ginger released her grip, not sure if she'd heard him right.
"What'd you say?"
"I can't go back with you."
"Wha-eh...Why? What's the reason now?" Ginger questioned, looking betrayed.
"You were in the True Lab, so...you know what went on down there, right?"
"Yeah..."
"So, then...you know how...Flowey happened, right?"
"Oh my Glaux...You're DETERMINATION."
"I can feel it inside me. It's...it's heavy. It's weighing me down. I'm a monster. You saw it first hand; monsters' bodies aren't able to handle that much-"
"Oh, no. No, no, no, that can't happen. Not after what you've already been through, it...it can't..."
"...It's okay, Ginger. Besides, a-at least I have my compassion back. Even if I do end up a melting mess, I'll still have my SOUL. I'll still be able to feel for others. It's...it's better than being a soulless flower again."
Ginger was still on the verge of panic, but suddenly, she froze, her eyes shut.
And when they opened, they revealed a piercing glare.
"...No."
"What?"
"No. I won't allow it. I'm NOT going to let you live your life down here in agony and loneliness. You've done so much for everyone already. It's the least I can do for you."
"I don't think there's anyway to get around this one, Ginger," the prince admitted. "Besides, I'm not worth that much; especially after everything I did to hurt everyone."
"Asriel, that was a different timeline. This is now. In a way, all the things you did in your resets essentially never happened."
"But I still remember doing everything in the resets."
"Asriel...you might remember, but...it's all been undone. And now that Flowey's gone, you don't have to worry about that anymore."
"I know, but...still. I think it's better I just stay here. Besides, it'll give me some more time to myself to think about things."
"There has to be a way. If there's one thing I know I've got, it's DETERMINATION, and I've seen what DETERMINATION can do. It has to be able to do something about this. I just have to think of something..."
"Well...if, by any chance, you do, feel free to tell me. But if you don't...don't blame yourself over it. You bringing back my SOUL is more than I could've ever asked for on its own."
Ginger barely even heard him, she was already so deep in her own thoughts. She began to pace back and forth, and Asriel simply sat back down and continued tending to the flowers; odds were Ginger wasn't going to think of a solution, so he had nothing better to do. Ginger started to pace faster, as though it would help her think quicker. She didn't know how long it would take before Asriel's DETERMINATION would cause him to break down and melt like the Amalgamates in the lab. A few minutes? Several hours? Time was of the essence. She had to think quickly. What could be the missing piece to the broken jigsaw puzzle that was Asriel? What could be used to keep him from breaking down and melting? What did she have that he didn't? It would take something pretty powerful to accomplish something like that. She had DETEMINATION-More than him, even. That was a pretty great power. Powerful enough to save everyone, powerful enough to kill everyone, and even powerful enough to grant her the strange ability to...
Travel through points in time, and even start the entire timeline again from the point at which she fell down the mountain.
The ability to SAVE.
The ability to RESET.
Maybe. Just maybe...She didn't know whether or not it would actually work, but...
It was worth a shot if it meant he'd truly be SAVED.
"Asriel!"
"Huh!?"
Her sudden outburst startled him quite badly.
"I have an idea! It just might be crazy enough to work!"
"Wh-what is it?"
"You know how it goes. The most DETERMINED creature in the Underground gains the ability to SAVE and RESET, right?"
"Yeah. I know that. I used the power more than anybody when I had it."
"Well...what if I somehow...gave the power back to you? If a power like that can alter time itself, it can probably work itself throughout your body and be able to hold you together. It just might be what we're missing here!"
"G-give me the power to SAVE and RESET? H-how would you do something like that?"
"Maybe I can do it the same way I actually USE the power; just by willing it. If I can will it into working, then who's to say I can't will it right onto someone else?"
"I...but...Are you sure you want to give that up? It's your power, now, not mine."
"Maybe, but...I don't have any regrets over this journey. There's nothing I'm going back for, especially now that the Barrier's gone. Besides, I...don't think I'll miss it; I rarely ever used it to begin with. Only when...Only when I knew there was a way to go back and make things right. And it was only a couple of times."
"You're positive?"
"Absoultely."
"But...what if it doesn't work?"
"We'll...cross that bridge when we get to it, Asriel. But it's worth a try, isn't it?"
"I...Well..."
"I want to do this for you, Asriel. You're the one who deserves a happy ending the most out of anyone."
"You...really think that?"
"I do."
She took the Boss Monster's hands and sported a confident smirk. Asriel nearly teared up again; never had he imagined that anyone would ever forgive him for the things he did. He was touched.
"Come on, buddy. Don't get all mushy again on me now."
"S-sorry. I'm just...too soft for my own good."
"Are you ready, Asriel?"
"I...Y-you know what? Yeah! Let's try it and see if it works!"
"Alright..."
Ginger shut her eyes, wondering if she could simply will her powers away through DETERMINATION alone. She tried it, and lo and behold, something began to develop inside her.
Is...is it working?
She didn't open her eyes, but she could see the dimly lit cavern getting lighter and lighter. She knew that if she opened her eyes, she'd probably be blinded by the intense brightness that had swamped them. And as the light grew ever brighter, Ginger felt an odd prick, deep inside of her, that she hadn't felt in a long time, and she knew that Asriel was thinking the same things she was, and willing them through his own DETERMINATION.
It was working.
And as suddenly as it had appeared, the bright light faded away, and everything went dark.
...
...
...
"Ugh...I...Whah?"
Ginger opened her eyes. All she could see was yellow. She blinked to clear her vision, and her surroundings finally came into view; she was lying in the bed of Golden Flowers, just like when she first woke up in the Underground
And when she remembered why she was here again, she jolted back up.
"Asriel!?"
She looked around for him, finally spying him lying on the ground a few feet to her right, unmoving, except for the steady rise and fall of his body. Alive, and his form still retained. Good. That was a good sign. Now to wake him up.
She stood to her feet, then approached the young Boss Monster.
"Asriel, come on. You gotta get up. I need to know if it worked!"
"Hmm...What?"
He opened his groggy eyes, vision still blurry. Was that Ginger? It was hard to tell; the blurry image before him didn't really resemble her much. Sure, she was fair skinned, but he didn't remember her face being...quite that white. The splotch that he assumed was her face looked nearly as white as his own fur coat, and it moved to the back of his head to try and speak right into his ear.
"Come on, Azzy. Rise and shine, bud."
Her voice was more plain than her image, and he sat up and rubbed his eyes, finally comprehending what she was saying to him. And as he did, he noticed something; the tingling sensation of his powers beginning to fade was gone, and so was the heavy sensation of the DETERMINATION coursing through his veins and overwhelming his magic-constructed body. He felt like he could hold himself together again. He felt just like his old self again.
It had worked.
It had actually worked.
And when he realized it, he sprang up onto his legs that he'd missed so much.
"Ginger! We did it! It worked!"
"It did!?"
She looked up at him from where she was standing...Odd. She remembered being taller than him, but now it looked like he was towering at a good DOUBLE her height, even while sitting down.
"It did! We actually-GUAAGH!"
Asriel shrieked when he finally turned and saw her, then scrambled to his feet and backed away from Ginger as far as he could, almost all the way up against the cave wall.
"What's going on!?" she questioned, swiveling her head around in search of whatever he could have screamed at. When she saw nothing, she turned her head back his way.
"Whoa...When'd you get so big, huh? Didn't expect the Save 'n' Reset power to do THAT."
"Y-y-y..." he stuttered, pointing a furry digit down at her. "Y-you're a-"
"Amazing? A genius?" she mused.
"You're a BIRD!"
As soon as he spat that out, she froze.
"...What...?"
Ginger stopped to ponder what he'd just said, then raised her arms to examine them. Her eyes widened at what she beheld.
In the place of her human arms was a set of familiar-looking, broad, brown feathered wings.
She proceeded to look down at her feet. Her stubby human toes had lengthened back into nimble talons, each tipped with a curved, black claw, and she flexed them and tapped the talons on the hard ground; they made a clicking noise, proving they were really there. And then she tried turning her head again; it swiveled in every direction, from front to back, and the other way around. And when she brought a feather to her face to feel around her mouth, she traced the telltale shape of her small, hooked beak. And the messenger bag. It sat beside the bed of Golden Flowers, and it was now enormous compared to her. Could it be?
"Ha...ha ha..."
She was ecstatic. This was real, too.
She was an owl again.
"Is...is that what you used to-"
"YES!"
Both of them were beaming now. He was back. She was back. They were both back to the way they should be. And it was going to stay that way. The goat monster scooped the Barn Owl up in his comparatively huge arms, and the two shared a heartfelt embrace. The two of them were hysteric, shedding tears of joy, yet laughing at the same time. It was unbelieveable. It was incredible. They were back. They'd been restored.
And they were here to stay.
Ginger was the one to calm herself first, and she squirmed her way out of Asriel's tight hold and dropped back onto the terra firma below, wiping her large, blue eyes free of tears.
"Let's go, Asriel...They're waiting for us."
The now fully restored Asriel Dreemurr wore the biggest smile she'd ever seen on a monster, even bigger than the biggest smile she'd seen on any Temmie, and he looked up at the hole his feathered friend had first come through upon her arrival. Ginger did the same; it was First Black; the two hour-long period of darkness, when the moon was low in the sky and before the sun began to spill its first rays of light over the horizon. If they got back quick enough, she could probably get everyone to see the sunrise.
"Well, what are you waiting for, Dreemurr? Last one there's a rotten egg!"
Without another word, she bolted out of the cavern and headed back for the entrance to the Ruins. She could have just as easily opened her wings and shot up out of the hole directly above them, but she didn't. In her happiness, she'd completely forgotten that. And even if she hadn't, she wouldn't have wanted to, anyway. They would go the way they came here, taking one last walk through the Underground.
And they would do it together.
"I'm right behind you, Ging'!"
He considerately scooped the messenger bag up onto his back, then followed her out of the darkness and into his old home, past all of the puzzles, and past where the Froggits had stood around. They were gone now, having left for the surface. The two of them continued through the old catacombs, the only mishap being Asriel falling through one of the hidden holes in the floor. But the two got a decent laugh out of it.
By the time they'd reached the old house, both of them had worn themselves out. Ginger decided that, perhaps, it wasn't the best idea to run the whole way back.
"Let's...try to take this...a little slower, eh, bud?"
"Y-yeah...Good call."
"You...uh...brought the bag?"
"It's...kinda heavy," he huffed. "...What's in it?"
"Oh...A few things, really. Some paper, pencils...a sharpener, PVC bow, and...uh...my cloak and armor."
"Oh...That stuff. Heh...No wonder."
"Sorry 'bout that...I'd carry it myself, but...Now, it might crush me."
"It's fine..." He swallowed, beginning to catch his breath again. "Uh...Mind if I have the bag back?"
"Well, duh. It's yours anyway, Heck, you might as well as keep the stuff in it, too. It won't fit me anymore," she mused.
And then, she eyed up the tree growing outside of Toriel's house.
"Hey..." she said to him, regaining her breath. "I might not be able to lift that thing anymore, but I can do something else...Watch this."
Ginger stretched her wings up over her head, synced her jump with the first flap of her wings, and then, for the first time in so long, lifted herself off the ground and into the air, and her wings took her spiraling up and around the tree. The feeling of her feet finally leaving the ground, paired with the cool air blowing against her and flowing through the white feathers on her face was more wonderful than she ever remembered, and she wondered why she ever took it for granted. When she finally decided to perch, she rested her talons on one of the topmost branches of the tree and curled them around it. The branch ever so slightly swayed when she put her full weight on it and folded her wings.
Asriel was amazed; never before had he seen a bird fly so gracefully and effortlessly. He didn't even hear any flapping.
"Wow..." he marveled.
"Man...I haven't felt this good in a long time. I'm light, I'm happy...I'm free as a bird."
"Isn't that because you ARE one?"
"Oh, you got that pun, didja?"
"You've been taking lessons from Sans, haven't you?"
"Well, it's not like that's a bad thing. I mean, really; his jokes are..."
"Oh, no..."
"...sansational."
"GINGER, YOU DIDN'T!"
As much as he wanted it to come out a rebuke, the young Boss Monster couldn't help but burst out laughing again as he said it, and the Barn Owl was quick to follow.
"Ginger, you're too much..."
"Well, great things can come in small packages. And I'm certainly no exception."
"Nope, you sure aren't."
"And neither are you, you know?"
Asriel's pristine white-furred face went light pink.
"Aw, come on. I-I haven't..."
The smile on his face fell.
"...I haven't done anything for anyone except cause pain."
"Az, everything you did in those timelines has been undone. Mind if I call you 'Az?'"
"No, that's, ah...what Chara called me sometimes, actually. But that's not completely what I meant."
"Well, then, what DO you mean?"
She flew off of the tree branch and began to walk beside him back into the old house.
"That...the day that we tried to get the human SOULs from the village. The day I...you know."
"...Fell down?"
"That's right. M-mom and Dad...They saw me cross the Barrier back into the garden. They were there when I...I...I didn't even get to say goodbye."
"But now you're getting a second chance at this. No more goodbyes, Asriel. Not yet, at least."
"Yeah..."
He still seemed upset. Ginger figured that now would be a good time to lighten up the mood.
"Hey."
"Hm?"
"I, uh...think there's still some butterscotch-cinnamon pie left in the kitchen. Want me to take a peek?"
"Well...I'm not usually supposed to eat sweet stuff like that before-"
"Dude."
Her remark made him stop short, and she turned towards him, looking him dead in the eye.
"You were killed by the humans when all you wanted to do was help everyone, and in turn, you ended up trapped in a soulless plant for Glaux-knows-how-long from your perspective after all those resets, completely lacked the ability to feel love and compassion, and the only thing that you had to live for was your DETERMINATION. And it was like that until you finally absorbed all of those SOULs, broke the Barrier and saved all of monsterkind from another eternity of imprisonment. And if I hadn't decided to come along, your reward for all of that would have been losing your ability to feel all over again, let alone your true form. And you're apparently still not over your guilt of everything you did in the other timelines. You've been through HELL. You're STILL going through hell. I think you at LEAST deserve a frickin' piece of PIE for everything you've been through. Don't you?"
Asriel stared at her, wide-eyed. She...did have a fair point.
"I...guess that makes sense, when you put it that way."
"Thank you. Now you go in there, sit at the table, and wait for me to bring you a slice of buttery-spicy goodness."
The Boss Monster obeyed, stepping into the small house for the first time in forever, and seating himself in the exact same spot he used to when the rest of his family sat down to dine. The chair was slightly dusty from lack of use, having only been recently disturbed by Ginger herself, and even then, it hadn't been touched in nearly a week after the fact. The owl was in the kitchen, trying to work the butter knives from the drawer to cut her friend a slice. It was a good thing the butter knives were fairly light, despite the fact that they didn't cut through the crust as easily as she hoped; it was going to take a bit to get the piece out without completely butchering the pie. But she didn't dare trust herself with the immense steak knives. If they were more efficient at cutting the pie, they would be more efficient at chopping her talons clean off if they somehow slipped. Come to think of it, her decreased size made the entire pie bigger than her.
Finally, she managed to cut a wedge out, and slipped it onto the paper plate she'd fished out of the cabinet before hopping back onto the floor and carrying it to Asriel on foot.
"Indulge."
"Oh, man. Mom's cooking. I can't believe I didn't even miss this stuff."
He took the plate in his hands, grabbed the unused fork that'd been situated at his seat and dug in. Ginger fluttered to the top of the seat across from him and perched there.
"Mpff...Aren'tcha gonna hapf any yourselpf?" the Boss Monster questioned through a mouthful of pie.
"Nah, I'm good for now. Honestly, I think her Snail Pie would be more my taste."
Asriel swallowed before responding.
"Really? Chara couldn't stand the stuff; most humans don't, so they say."
"Yeah, but you gotta remember; I was born like this, not a human. Snails and slugs aren't that weird for owls to eat."
"Oh. How, uh...How do you guys prepare them?"
"Like, what, cooking? Eh. A lot of the time, we just eat 'em raw, right out of the shells. But sometimes the chefs in the Union kitchen make some sort of sour jelly out of the milkberries growing on the smaller Ga'Hoole trees in Tyto and the Mirror Lakes, and they put the slug or snail on the plate, and they just drown them in the stuff. It's soft, it's tart, it's got just enough sweetness; nothing too overboard. It's one of the best things I've ever put in my beak. Except maybe chocolate."
"Wow...I wonder if I'd ever get to try something like that?"
"Who knows? Maybe you...you can..."
Ginger trailed off, and her eyes widened in realization of something
"What? What is it?"
"My Glaux," she almost breathed. "I just realized...They don't know."
"Who doesn't know about what?"
"Everyone back at New Home. They don't know about...this!"
She motioned her wings up and down herself.
"They don't know I used to be an owl! You're the only one!"
"What!? Wh-why didn't you tell them!?"
"I didn't think they would have bought it! You don't just say 'I used to be an owl!' and expect people to believe you! Besides, I-I didn't think this was all gonna happen; I said it myself, I thought I was stuck as a human for the rest of my life!"
"But...does that mean they won't believe me when I say 'I used to be a flower?'"
Ginger paused. She realized that Asriel had a point.
"Magic down here works in strange ways, doesn't it?"
Ginger nodded solemnly in agreement; true, if it was possible for Asriel to come back from the dead as a flower and then restore his original form with the aid of all the SOULs in the Underground, it was probably just as plausible to say that Ginger had been turned into a human upon her arrival, and only reverted back into a Barn Owl by giving up her powers in order to sustain the young prince.
"Besides, even if you look different, it's still you. They know you well enough to know it's you. I know it."
"Yeah...Yeah, I guess you're right...But they'll still probably be freaked out when they see me."
"Heh..."
Asriel scraped the last bit of his pie onto the fork before finishing it off.
"...Same here."
"Well...I guess we're going to have to get that part over with, huh?"
"Yeah. We've got a lot of explaining to do for when we get back."
He stood up, and the two of them made their way to the stairs leading down to the exit to the Ruins.
"Hey, Ginger."
"Hm? What?"
"Wanna perch on my arm? Your legs are shorter than mine, and I don't want you getting tired."
"You know I can fly, right?"
"Yes, I did. I just thought it'd be easier on you."
Ginger was about to debate that he didn't have to, and he might even end up hurt by her black claws digging into him, but she couldn't. His offer was too genuine, too kind to turn down. And, really, the trip back would probably be more pleasant being right at his side.
"Eh...Okay. I'll take you up on that."
Asriel extended an arm, and the Barn Owl lightly fluttered her wings and lightly curled her talons around it, facing herself in the same direction he was.
"But make sure to tell me if your arm gets tired, you hear?"
"I gotcha. Now, come on. Let's do this thing!"
The restored prince opened the giant door and exited his first home for the first time in what was practically ages.
And he didn't look back at it as he trudged through the snow; it would probably be the last time he ever saw the Ruins as well.
And the same thing went for the young Barn Owl that sat comfortably on his arm.
A/N: So Asriel's back for good, and Ginger's an owl again. I'm probably gonna get a lot of mixed views on how I did this.
Some people think it's better for Asriel to be left behind to turn back into Flowey, since it delivers that extra emotional "umph." Others think it'd be nice finding a way to bring him back. The same goes for Ginger, and how the Optional Ending goes with her integrating herself into human society and putting her past with the Pure Ones behind.
...Whatever. This is a fanfiction. I can do whatever the sprink I want with it. XD
I've read up on SOULs on the Undertale wiki. According to some of Alphys' log entries in the True Lab, monster SOULs could supposedly be stored in vessels for later use. She was going to try this on Golden Flowers, but they were apparently too difficult to work with and didn't work much differently from the control cases holding the human SOULs, and she never extracted any monster SOULs anyway, so instead she had the bright idea of injecting the one growing with Asriel's DNA dust or whatever in it with a healthy dose of DETERMINATION. And then Flowey happened. Thanks a lot, Jurassic Dork...No, like...seriously. Thank you for that, Alphys. If it weren't for you, Asriel wouldn't be here and the Barrier wouldn't be gone.
There are only a few chapters left. Remember to R&R! Thanks for following along! :D