It only takes a few more hours for Flowey to decide this whole operation was a bad idea.

The horrible thing though, the realization dawning on him slowly, is he can't exactly back out now, can he? Asking Frisk to simply carry him all the way back to the mountain and leave him there forever would be absurd and not only because it would mean going back to wasting his days in the empty ruins of their once home, soaked in memories and regrets. No, for a much less eloquent reason Flowey knows he can not back out now.

It would be pathetic for him to do so.

He never cared much for what others thought of him and he still doesn't. Thank Asgore for small mercies and the fact that at least one vital part of himself still feels intact, some tiny thing that didn't change. But he cares for other things now, cares so fucking much it hurts. His parents, their grief evident in every single thing they do. Watching the way these idiots rejoiced in their new freedom, rejoiced at the world open and full of possibilities at their feet. All happiness and suffering of others bearing on him like through a kaleidoscope, multiplied tenfold.

So Flowey has two options now: either deal with these new emotions head-on or ignore them completely, probably meaning they'll come back to bite him in the ass later.

And wasn't Papyrus just the perfect excuse to justify picking the worse out of those two options?

"Well, something is up, I'll admit it," Flowey tells Frisk, who has taken the opportunity of being forced by Toriel to clean their room before dinner to have a private moment to discuss their predicament. "But I don't think anybody else noticed. I'm surprised you did, actually."

Frisk stalls for a moment, watching him with cautious eyes. Flowey thinks it is pretty tiring, not being trusted like this, not to mention tastelessly ironic seeing as they don't have the cleanest history to look back on themself. There is little use in convincing them he has better intentions this time, considering he isn't too sure about that himself yet.

Apathy is such a strong motivator to shake.

"I didn't," they sign eventually, sitting down in front of him. "I felt it. For a long time, I've always kn-"

"No explanations needed," he interrupts them automatically, maybe a bit of a knee-jerk reaction. As if it wasn't already annoying enough to struggle with all the new emotions, he has no time for ones long dead and buried. "Asriel was like that too."

They smile, amused. "I can't picture it."

The exaggeration of the gestures and their facial expression make it out to be a sarcastic statement – Chara had been quite fond of sarcasm so Flowey is very familiar with the nuance – but he pretends not to notice. "Me neither."

It had been quite helpful though, especially with one like Chara, who the world had hardened into regarding their weakest moments as failures. It had helped, when they did not want to talk, that Asriel could still tell the good days from the bad days at least somewhat and act accordingly. Do damage control.

Which, looking back on it now, was probably not something he should have been forced to deal with at that age.

"He's a good actor, I'll give him that," he says, shifting the subject back to familiar territory instead of bitter nostalgia. "But it's not doing him any favors now because he's only acting the way they think he should be acting and it shows."

Frisk raises an eyebrow, meaning they really hadn't noticed just as they said.

"He's overcorrecting. I don't know why, but it's creeping me out."

They consider this for a moment, but shrug eventually. Flowey doesn't want to mention that this is exactly what he means, that Papyrus has even them fooled so thoroughly that they can't see he isn't acting like his perfect, happy self anymore. He is acting even more perfect, even more happy, more more more- but indistinguishable from the role they had all forced him to take in their small-minded views of the world.

Papyrus never wanted to burden anybody with his own issues. And now they had come full circle, looped back around and mistaken this selflessness for truth that he had no burdens to begin with.

This oblivious act in the end only served to keep others in the dark, but Flowey would be lying if he'd say it wasn't that paradox which had drawn him to Papyrus in the first place. He had found endless entertainment in prying at his secrets bit by bit, like a curious child chipping away at the gold-tone on an art piece to reveal the cracked surface underneath.

In the end, it had given Flowey little pleasure to watch this fake persona break down and the performance revealed, and he had killed Papyrus instead, disgusted by the futility of it all. This was before he knew about the pertaining memory thing-

He shakes his petals, and watches Frisk clean their room for a bit. Their idea of 'cleaning' seems to consist mostly of putting random junk in drawers haphazardly and pushing any stray mess under their bed. For all their determination, they weren't very fond of putting effort into things they didn't like doing, Flowey had noticed.

They turn to him suddenly and it startles him out of his empty thoughts. He can't recall what he had been thinking about the last few minutes, what he had been feeling, but he kind of misses it already.

They wave to get his attention. "Why don't we just ask him?"

"You can do that," he responds, "but Papyrus doesn't exactly have the best track record when it comes to telling people things he doesn't want known, especially concerning himself. And he's quite good at circular reasoning if you haven't noticed."

Sans could flaunt his fancy magic tricks all he wants, it was Papyrus who could make you want to die out of sheer annoyance when you were having a conversation that already lasted fifteen minutes and you still weren't any closer to getting an answer to your questions.

Flowey should know.

"Besides, I don't think he's that aware he's doing it badly," he adds. "Contrary to popular belief, he's too smart for that."

They push the last stack of papers, probably homework, into their backpack, crumpling them beyond recognition but looking proud of themself nonetheless, before sitting down again, paying full attention. "What do you mean?"

"You think a guy who has been practicing his whole life at pretending and nailed it pretty much flawlessly since forever would forget about the intricacies of the trade. Gee, feels like awfully convenient timing." He lets the words sink in before continuing. "No, some outside force has to throw him off balance first, catch him off guard enough to drop the ball. It happened before, I was the outside force that time."

And how beautiful that had been. Even with Papyrus being as adaptable as he was and adjusting to Flowey's secret a little too quick for comfort. But in that frail moment, Flowey had seen through Papyrus' facade too.

Frisk beams at him, the strange sort of confidence only a reckless 9-year-old has disgusting him beyond measure. "Then you need to ask him," they sign simply as if any of this can ever be that simple.

He wonders, distantly and unattached from reason, if Chara was ever like this. When they fell, their innocence had already been tarnished by reality. Maybe they had never shared Asriel's idealistic optimism in the first place. Had seen all the ugliness the world had to offer and accepted the way it would always outbalance the beauty. It had killed them inside and then, eventually, it had killed them for real, Asriel being left with the corpse growing cold beneath his fingertips and the taste of regret blossoming in his throat.

Well, if nothing else this whole ordeal was making him awfully poetic.

"I'll ask him," he says, and for a moment their sincere expression doesn't even hurt that badly.

The opportunity doesn't come to him until a few days later. Things are very busy topside and Papyrus eagerly buries himself in a workload that would probably kill Sans if he so much as thought about it. More than anything else Flowey gets a distinct impression that Papyrus is avoiding... something. Not him, per se, in fact after their first awkward encounter Papyrus probably realized the faults behind his behavior and again altered course to come across as more convincing.

The problem being that Flowey only needed one moment of weakness and is determined not to let go now.

But broaching the subject with others around would still be a bad idea, not only because Papyrus is even more likely to deny anything is wrong than if Flowey just confronts him alone, also because he really doesn't want any of the others to meddle. Especially the Smiley Trashbag, who Flowey now feels even more than his regular dislike for. Sans never did Papyrus any favors, he wasn't going to start now.

It's somewhere around noon, Flowey is still getting used to the whole day-and-night thing on the surface. Monsters slept – well, most of them did. Papyrus once again happens to be an exception to the rule – but it was an artificial thing, dictated by clocks and regulations instead of the setting of the sun.

"What are these?" he asks, picking up a nearby piece of paper but not actually making an attempt to read it before Papyrus snatches it from him again.

"Applications," the skeleton answers dismissively, filling out form after form at an alarming speed. Papyrus has a tendency to get absorbed in his work. Flowey recalls the rock formation back in Snowdin and watching for days in abject horror as his only friend dedicated hours upon hours of meticulous work into painting it. Even back then, when Flowey was still telling himself he did not care for anyone or anything, it had left him with a vague sense of awe.

(He also remembers how nobody in town had really commented on it and has to stomp down feeling vicariously offended on Papyrus' behalf)

The pen pauses mid-stride for a moment. Papyrus smiles at him, not guilty at all but apologetically as if just noticing his uncharacteristic curtness, and Flowey can't disconnect the insincerity anymore. It's subtle, barely detectable yet the most obvious thing in the world to him, but now that he knows it's there and the seed has been planted, it's impossible for him not to perceive.

"Sorry," Papyrus says, and the way he says it is not right either. "I do believe these need to be sent in by the end of the week and as usual my lazy brother has been no help and everybody else is busy. They're applications for citizenship."

Right, the kid had promised no more resets. Flowey wonders if Papyrus felt a twinge of doubt at their words when first spoken, knowing how fragile their promises could be. He wonders if Papyrus would let that stop him from making the utmost of their time here regardless.

Probably not.

It's harder than he thought it would be. Slowly it dawns on him why, the awareness burning at the back of his mind but the need to go through with it brighter still. He spits it out, fights the urge to swallow the words. "Papyrus, is something wrong?"

Papyrus stares at him, lasting one long moment unguarded enough for it to ache at Flowey's absent heartstrings.

"That's a silly question," Papyrus answers, and the nonchalance air slipping into his voice is all wrong, stabs through Flowey like their knife once did, sharp and tangible. "What would be wrong?"

The memory is real and it burns even more vividly, scalds him from the inside out. It's been a while since Flowey felt fear, but now he isn't sure if it ever left. He hadn't wanted to die and he hadn't wanted any of this to happen. He hadn't wanted to hear the wrong answer.

And he is afraid.

What would he have done if Papyrus had said yes? What could he have done to rectify this?

What could he have done to rectify anything anymore?

"I don't know," he says.

Papyrus continues writing. "If you don't know then it doesn't matter. You can't fix what doesn't need to be fixed."

It happened in between the flowers. It happened at Chara's grave. It happened exactly at the same place where he had buried them, had left the petals stained with their blood and laid down next to them to turn to dust.

The first time Papyrus broke into pieces happened at the same place Asriel fractured.

And it shouldn't be significant. It shouldn't change a thing. But somehow it meant everything and all Flowey could see was the look on Papyrus' face then. He hadn't cried, he hadn't yelled or begged or gotten angry. He had opened his arms and smiled like a damn idiot when he told Flowey he remembered everything and forgave him anyway. Forgave him for revealing the ugly truth about them both.

That he still believed Flowey was a good person not despite it, but because of it.

He had said that the first time and the second time and all the times after to a point where Flowey wasn't even listening to it anymore, but the candor of those words had stuck with him.

Maybe that's why it is such a frightening thing when he realizes Papyrus has never sounded so empty before.

"But-"

"Really..." Papyrus turns over the last paper with a dramatic flourish. Flowey hadn't noticed he was done, hadn't noticed he hadn't stopped once to look up at him since. "It doesn't matter, Flowey."

You can't fix what doesn't need to be fixed. And sometimes you can't fix what needs to be fixed either.

Papyrus smiles at him again and that too feels empty.

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