The sound of the door to her children's bedroom closing behind her seemed impossibly loud in the moment, and it echoed through her soul. Though Toriel knew she would not turn back or look to escape from the looming discussion ahead, she still felt the stress associated with being trapped, only deepening her dread. It took great resolve to hold her posture and composure, but she managed it regardless. Facing her children in a calm, understanding manner throughout all this was imperative to it going well.

The less she overreacted, the more information she likely would get to hear. She'd learned her lesson when listening to Sans share his own secrets, she wasn't going to make the same mistakes and inadvertently hurt them through her reactions the same way she had hurt him. Or at least… more realistically… she'd do her best to minimize that as much as possible. She had been through situations and conversations like this before and come out of it in the end. This would be no different. She could do this. She had to do this.

She subconsciously grasped at the now fainter buzz of alcohol still in her system, clinging to its numbing effects and trying in vain to amplify it as much as possible. It was hard to say in that moment if she wished she was more or less inebriated to face this.

Stars above, give me your strength... She offered up in silent prayer as she began to formulate what she should say to start all this.

It was a task that would have been much easier had whispers of that damn headache not been throbbing within her head. It was an extra annoyance she doubted would recede with all the stress she was currently enduring and would surely endure going forward with this… but perhaps it would at least serve as a reminder to try and stay as calm as possible, not matter what was said.

From their place on Frisk's bed, her children were staring up at her. Beady black and soft brown, perhaps trending towards scarlet in the low light, met her own ruby red eyes with equal parts fear and resolve. Emotions that were much the same as her own. On top of that, she could all but feel Sans' presence beyond the door behind her, anxiously waiting as well. She couldn't keep hesitating.

She drew in and released a deep breath through her nostrils and looked at her children with less intense dread clawing at her insides. Then she made herself be the one to break the silence.

"My children, you have something you wish to tell me, do you not?" She asked, though it came off as more of a statement. "Please, do not be afraid to share it with me. No matter what it is, I will listen and make every effort to understand."

She made slow deliberate eye contact with them both, then slowly knelt down in front of the bed to be closer to their eye level.

"And I promise, nothing you could tell me could make me stop loving you. I made the mistake in my past of turning away from a loved one in a time of great emotional damage. I will not allow myself to do that again. You have my word on that."

Already speaking those words aloud wished to bring tears to her eyes, not helped with the nagging, dull pain of her headache. But she found composure again quickly without dropping her gaze from theirs. Frisk and Flowey both clearly felt the full weight of the words, but reacted to it differently. Frisk looked just about as close to tears from mixed emotion as she was, but Flowey mostly just looked taken aback, beyond the clear dread that had been there in his expression the whole time.

He blinked, slowly, then turned to share a long look with Frisk. The silence from them hung for a few moments, before something in Frisk's gaze caused the flower monster to sigh, perhaps releasing the breath he'd been holding.

"Want... to start like we planned?" Flowey asked in a somewhat distant voice, though his body was rather stiff with nerves.

Frisk nodded grimly and finally looked up at Toriel again. Their hands were shaky as they slowly began to sign to her.

(Mom… do you know about... Resets?) They asked, fingers threatening to lock up from obvious stress.

There would be little easing into this it seemed. Seeing them form that word openly reignited those buried feelings of desperate denial that still longed for some excuse to see the light of day again. But just as hearing them speak that word days ago had banished the last of her doubt, seeing them sign it right there in front of her was the final nail in the coffin.

Her soul seized up inside her, but she held strong and didn't allow herself to be too affected. This was something she expected, nothing new. That part was surely coming, and she was sure she needed to save the majority of her resolve for that moment. But she did at least allow the full weight of all the stress that hiding her knowledge of the Resets had inflicted upon her show in her crimson eyes.

There was no need to hide it anymore. They knew just as she had suspected they did. This would be the first lie to end, and she was happy to be the one to start the process. Even if the subject at hand could hardly make her less so.

"Yes my child… I do." She said solemnly, not faltering even when Frisk flinched a bit in response. "Sans told me of them. The burden of that knowledge was weighing him down and affecting him deeply enough that it finally became too much for him. Especially as he became more… attached to us all, our freedom, this life we have all built for ourselves. It was all enough to chip away at his apathy. But with that… it also brought the full force of all that pain and fear he'd been shielding himself from."

Her eyes grew heavy and drifted downward, remembering how deeply affected Sans had been during those first days. And she was again struck with how long ago those occurrences already seemed. Much like the rapid events that unfolded when Frisk fell into the Underground, it seemed these past few weeks were also set to be a time of swift, drastic change. She could only hope that the eventual result would be the same, their lives, even their world, changed for the better.

"I recognized his silent suffering, and eased him into telling me of the many things he has endured throughout his years…" She went on, curling her claws against her knee. "Far too many things…"

She forced herself to look back at her children, a mixture of sternness and sorrow pushing itself onto her expression.

"Including… the Resets… and the role that you two played in them."

Again, Frisk reacted physically to her words as though she had struck them, and she could see a deep fear shining in their eyes. It reminded her of the expression they wore when she, in her desperation, had turned her flames towards them in a final attempt to keep them within the Ruins. At least… the one they wore during this timeline… or had they been more stoic in this one? Already knowing exactly how to talk her down…

Was the image she was recalling from the true first time they'd met? She couldn't be sure, and the increasing pain from her headache encouraged her not to dwell on it further. Besides, she never wanted to inspire that kind of fear in her child's eyes ever again. Knowing she could be at all reminding them of whatever dire circumstances they had originally come from before climbing Mt. Ebott was too painful to bear, even in a case as serious as this…

Flowey, in stark contrast, and as expected, hardly offered a reaction at all. He looked more annoyed and impatient than anything else, curling his vines fitfully against the rim of his pot. This was clearly not what he was so anxious to be discussing, and only served for him as yet another delay in getting to the important stuff. But she and he likely both recognized that this was still important, and needed to be addressed before they moved forward.

"It was pretty freaking obvious that you knew." He stated with a roll of his beady eyes, settling his cheek against a curled vine. "Seriously Mom, don't quit your day job to be an actor any time soon. I'm surprised Frisk took so long to see through your charade."

Frisk didn't give a response to that, just looked down at their socks and let the shadow of their hair cover their eyes. They remained that way, utterly stiff, as Flowey continued.

"Though I'm more surprised you didn't have a breakdown of your own after learning the truth." He noted, tilting his head more to the side. "Most people don't take the idea of their entire world being a pointless game that can be Reset at any moment all that well. I would know."

Toriel swallowed hard against a sudden tightness in her throat, remembering the devastating emotions and shock she'd endured upon hearing about the Resets for the first time. Even now, she could feel the lingering traces of their effects threatening to rip at her psyche if she dared think too hard about their implications. Again, the swelling of the summoned up from her headache kept her thoughts from drifting.

"It… was certainly not easy to hear… nor accept." She admitted, shutting her eyes briefly. "But I knew it to be the truth even whilst gripped by denial, no matter how much I wish it was not so."

Flowey made a soft scoffing noise in response, but it seemed half hearted in his case. She suspected there were biting words he wanted to direct her way. But she and him had already had their turbulent back and forth on the issue, and it seemed he was not willing to try and dredge up the same arguments he had already put forth before.

Frisk though…

The momentary silence was broken but a soft hitching of breath from the human child, who was losing their fight against their own swelling emotions. A few tears escaped from their eyes, falling and creating dark spots in the fabric of their pajama pants. The sight caused both Toriel and Flowey's attention to lock on to them, which only seemed to break their resolve more.

"I'm s-s-sorry…" They croaked out in their weak, quavering voice. "I'm s-so sorry M-mom…"

It was clearly all they could think to say. Toriel understood that all too well. There were a million things they were likely apologizing for, timelines and timelines of unspeakable sins and misdeeds lost to the power of the Resets, but not forgotten. Not by them, not by Flowey and not by the skeleton no doubt listening in outside the room. Their rare, precious voice was so heavy with remorse and self revulsion that her soul could hardly bear it. As though those words could actually cause it physical damage. They sounded so broken and lost, like a far, far older soul than just that of a child.

They sounded like Sans had… and likely, how she had as well.

Sans' words came back to her then as she watched them shudder, cover their face with their hands and fight back the sobs that wished to escape them.

"f-frisk is not a bad kid. they did some bad things, some really, really bad things. but they are just a kid tori, n-no kid should ever be given the kind of power they have. they can't be expected to always make the right choices, no matter how good-natured they are. that kind of power is corrupting, it makes them feel like nothing they do h-has real consequences. that detachment mixed with curiosity is like a poison."

"they regret all the bad shit they did, they've told me so a million times, bawling their eyes out and promising me they'd never r-reset again. all that. they really do love us, and knew the best way to free everyone by the end of it all. they knew the path to the best outcome."

None of those words were truly anything she needed to be reminded of, but seeing the reality of what he had been talking about unfolding there in front of her still tore further at her soul. Similar scenarios to this had occurred between just Sans and Frisk in the past, only when emotions were far more volatile, judging by his description.

It made sense, seeing as Sans was previously the only one who could have possibly held them accountable for what they had done. But now, they were finally spilling their immense guilt to their mother and she was determined to handle it as best she could. Even when it felt like her soul was going to shatter. And that damn headache wouldn't cease its pounding.

She moved forward and wrapped Frisk in her arms even before any potential answer left her, holding them tight. It hurt her more to feel just how shocked they were by that, as if they truly not expecting her to want anything to do with them once they'd admitted to their grave transgressions. All her earlier assurances had fallen away for them it seemed, and due to the enormity of just what they had done, she couldn't fully blame them.

But she held them to her anyway, feeling the despairing emotions from their powerful soul. She was their mother, and it was her job to bear the burden of what they had done right along with them, as well as firmly guide them down the right path. There was a brief flicker of that fear that had consumed her and Sans early on then, the fear that had triggered Sans' breakdown and led Toriel to have to frantictly keep up a lie for as long as she had. The fear Frisk would Reset in response to knowing Toriel of the Resets.

But it was also in that moment that she somehow became convinced that she had nothing to fear in that regard. Something she couldn't quite ascertain, but felt strongly from their soul. Frisk was devastated, but still determined. And that Determination was directed only towards the situation at hand, not at any attempts to flee from what they had done.

And as if to prove it further, they suddenly threw their arms around Toriel in return, holding on to her as much as their short arms could reach. It was only then did she finally speak her reply, holding her child protectively tight all the while.

"I know, my child." She soothed softly, glad when the words came out even and strong. "I know you are."

She just held them like that for a moment. And as she did, Sans' words continued to echo in her mind. Especially the final thing he had said regarding his view of Frisk's actions.

"even the bad things they did had some level of u-understandable intent. they wanted to know everything there was to know about our world… in order to help that… that flower…"

Those words in particular led her to look over at Flowey, who was simply watching the scene between her and Frisk with the same mix of impatience and unease. She and the flower monster made brief eye contact and he shied a bit from her gaze, though the emotion driving that wasn't fully clear. There were so many things about what Sans had said that she could theorize on, try and figure out, but she had to handle things with Frisk first. And ideally… hopefully… they would soon reveal to her the truth that would make that previous statement from Sans finally make sense.

She focused her attention back to Frisk, lightly resting her cheek against the top of their head.

"Sans told me of your devotion to keep your promise to him not to Reset ever again." She continued, in a more emotional tone. "I know you will hold true to that promise. That does not make what you and Flowey did okay by any means, nor does it absolve either of you of your actions, but it is a commitment towards a better path that you chose sweetheart. I know of the power you hold over us all, you could have so easily chosen not to care or take responsibility… but you did. That shows to me that the good in your soul, the good sort of love you have gained... is the part that prevails… the part that is the true you."

She paused then, letting the statement sink in for her miserable child. It did not cease the outpouring of tremendously guilty emotions from their soul, but it did seem to dull it somewhat. Enough to allow some warmth to ease its way back in. Flowey made an irritated sound under his breath, clearly fed up, but Toriel ignored him for the moment. She continued lightly stroking Frisk's back, hoping to calm their soft weeping as she went on.

"None of us here are free from having made terrible mistakes, my child." She murmured, more quietly. "We all have our own immense guilt to carry with us. The Underground was a place that bred desperation and corrupted all who were trapped there in some way. We must find it in ourselves to move on and leave the darkness of the mountain behind us. I know we can all heal and grow to be better people here through our freedom on the surface… For even humans and monsters who have made such grave mistakes as we have deserve mercy. And it was you, Frisk, who helped prove that to me."

That seemed to be enough to get their quiet sobs to stop, if only for the task of absorbing what she had said. Their soul's anguish further dissipated too, especially that which had been born from fear of her reaction to all this. They both knew there were no words or apologies that could ever make any of this okay, or erase the horrible things Frisk had done. But Toriel's expression of devotion still was clearly incredibly meaningful for her child to hear. And they understood the only thing that could be said in order to return that devotion to her, and all the other monsters they had grown to love.

"I w-won't Reset again." They rasped out, putting as much strength into their frail voice as they could manage. "I pr-promise Mom. I won't d-do it ever again."

The words came out strained and shaky. And they summoned more tearful hiccups from the child in her arms. But the sincerity behind them couldn't be missed. Toriel held them all the tighter, as though that would further ensure her next statement would sink in.

"I believe you sweetheart. I truly do." She assured them, with all the conviction she could offer.

There was a brief silence after those words left her, and the reaction she could feel from Frisk's soul told her that they had accepted what was said. It could not take the guilt from them, but it was the first step in any of this ever being worked through. The first step for her and her children to develop a relationship based on honesty and truth rather than endless circles of deception. And as much as her soul ached from the enormity of it all, for that, she was deeply grateful.

Even through the persistent pain in her head, she felt something like a weight lifted from her soul and all at once the air suddenly felt a little clearer. Though a noticeable tension still remained. This wasn't over yet.

"Sheesh Frisk, if you get all worked up now we are never going to get through this."

Flowey's harsh voice spoke up, as if mirroring her internal sentiment. He was looking at the sight of them with poorly masked disdain, still clearly restless with impatience. She gave the flower monster a stern look for his insensitivity, but when Frisk gently pushed away from her, she let them go. They sat back on the bed and wiped their eyes on their pajama sleeve before regaining their usual determined neutral expression.

(He's right.) They signed, hands only trembling noticeably for a moment more. (I'll be okay now… We really need to talk about…)

They couldn't seem to make themself form that last word, whatever it may be. Though she did notice them glance in Flowey's direction, catching his eye again. But Toriel responded with a small shake of her head, causing them both to give her their attention again. She wanted nothing more to just hear what they had been hiding from her and be done with it, but she knew she had to press a little more. There were things that she had to know in order to even begin to reconcile all this within herself.

"I understand there is more you wish to tell me, and I will be more than happy to listen." She assured them, before her expression hardened by degrees. "But first… I must ask you Frisk…"

She paused a moment to take a deep breath and try to fight back both the still insistent headache and the existential dread that came with what she was about to ask. Her previous experiences that she now had dealing with the subject helped it not seem like an impossible concept to face, but there was no removing the dread and despair it inspired entirely.

"I know at least the basic idea of why Flowey did what he did when he was in control." She said once she could manage it, casting a brief look in the flower monster's direction before turning her gaze back to Frisk. "But… when you realized what you were capable of doing... what drove you to… continue to Reset the way you did? To… step onto darker paths with your abilities?"

There was hardly a more harrowing question to ask, but it had to be done. They had to drain as much poison from this shared figurative wound as possible, lest it continue to fester and bring them all further silent anguish. Sans had told her his version of events, but she wanted to hear Frisk explain it themself. To hear how they viewed their abhorrent actions in those accursed timelines past.

As expected, Frisk stiffened and went pale as Toriel spoke, curling their hands into fists against their legs. She didn't even hear them breathe for a few moments, as they stared down at their hands and failed to keep them from shaking. It was past her understanding to guess what they must have been thinking, what images were flashing through their mind. Though she knew some of them must have aligned with what memories she had recovered through her turbulent dreams.

As if on cue, her cheek and lower stomach began to burn lightly with a familiar phantom pain, aching in a cruel sort of symphony with the throbbing in her head. She resisted the urge to touch the areas in question and just waited for Frisk's answer. The tension between the three of them reached a truly painful level before Frisk finally found it in themself to lift their hands and reply.

(It was… a lot of things.) They managed, the motions stiff and shaky. (Once you… stop choosing mercy... that first increase of LOVE… it does… bad things to your soul. Things that make you feel numb, like nothing you do actually matters… like everything and everyone around you aren't even real...)

Their ability to sign out these things seemed to get easier for them as they went on. There was no shortage of regret and misery behind the words, but Toriel could tell that this was a kind of release for them as well. They were lancing the wound and letting the poison finally flow away. It clearly hurt terribly, but was also a relief. One that was clearly a long time coming.

Now that they had started, she could tell part of them wanted to go into a full on tangest on the subject. One that potentially could spill everything and everything about their mindset back then. But another harsh look from Flowey and their own resolve towards the bigger situation at hand got them to refocus.

(I could try and explain for a long time… but like you said… nothing can justify my actions then.) They went on, biting their lip hard for a few moments. (But also… the original thought that led me to eventually become trapped in that addictive cycle of Resetting... It... it involves the important thing we want to tell you.)

That made Toriel perk up in surprise. In hindsight that was a little foolish, seeing as she should have guessed that this great secret was tied to the Resets one way or another. But her mind couldn't find any clear logical connections from what was said. She nodded and listened on, pressing her claws harder against her knees.

(There were some monsters I couldn't save that first time I achieved the best ending…) Frisk continued, eyes reflecting a deep sorrow. (And I just… couldn't help but go back and try again, try to find a way that I had missed that would let me save them. I felt like I had to! But…. no matter what I did to see how things would change… I never got any closer. I never learned enough to change that outcome. No matter what I did… there wasn't a timeline where I could save them...)

Toriel blinked slowly, trying to take in the tremendous weight of emotion in her child's voice. Beneath the defeat in their tone, there was also hints of the desperation and despair that had driven them to the point of no return. She had heard the phrase "the road to hell is paved with good intentions" in the past, and never before did it ever seem to hold so true as it did in Frisk's case.

She could understand at least the basis of that idea. Not justify by any means… but understand. Understand how much it would torment Frisk to know they had failed to save some of the monsters they had grown to feel responsible for. Toriel could now see why Sans had described Frisk's actions the way he had. And hearing it from them made the implications all the more harrowing.

(I just… wanted to create a perfect happy ending for everyone.) They signed, hands trembling briefly once more as they formed the words. (But it… just wasn't possible. This is the happiest ending we can achieve, it took me way too long to accept that.)

After those words left them, they lowered their hands to their lap and hung their head again. The motion somehow made them look so small, so powerless, so unlike the determined human with near godly powers that they truly were. Toriel could only stare at them for a few moments, trying to process any amount of what was said through the pain and haziness in her head. Eventually she swallowed hard and managed to find her voice again.

"I see…" She murmured simply, tone low and deflated.

What else was there to say? Well, truthfully there were perhaps endless things. More questions and details that could continue the conversation indefinitely. But she got the feeling that she would have to settle for what she had managed to get out of them today. At least in regards to the Resets. As for what lied ahead in the conversation though…

She found herself looking over at Flowey, driven again by Sans' words ringing in her head. He had said Frisk had been driven to explore all the optional timelines, even the darkest, because of a desire to help "that flower" Flowey. There was not doubt that he was at least one of those Frisk felt as though they couldn't save. But… he was right here wasn't he? Not dead or trapped Underground like the remains of Sans' father and the others caught up in the accident with the Core. She just couldn't understand it… what did Frisk mean by…they couldn't Save him?

Her headache flared up anew and she had to set her jaw a bit against the wave of pain. That and her staring seemed to cause Flowey to lose the last of his patience. When Frisk in front of them began to move their hands to sign again, he flicked out a vine and gripped their wrist with it in order to stop them.

"Enough beating around the bush." He snapped, though his tone lacked its usual bite. "I'm tired of waiting, I want to get this over with."

His words were almost a plea in a way, rather than an order. And that sentiment was reflected in his beady black eyes. They were harsh but still shone with emotions that were oh so rare to see from him. But still, Toriel couldn't allow such behavior to go unacknowledged, even in a situation like this.

"Flowey, let them speak." She admonished him gently. "This is important too."

But Frisk smiled weakly and shook their head, suddenly regaining some energy it seemed. Along with that odd mix of intense excitement and deep dread that confused her so deeply as to what they could possibly be about to tell her.

(No Mom, it's fine…) They signed. (Flowey is right, I can tell you everything later. However much you want to know. But this is more important right now)

They gave Flowey's vine a reassuring pat, and the flower monster released them and pulled the vine back into his pot with a stiff nod. There was a subtle shift of focus between her children then, from Frisk to Flowey. It allowed the human child to at least find some reprieve from all the heavy scrutiny, while the monster child… he was quickly displaying just how worried, even fearful he felt for what was to come. Enough so that the flower monster shivered lightly on his stem, though he was doing all he could to mask it with his sour expression. The only thing that dominated her mind beyond the headache, was the question of why?

Toriel looked at him with concern as he continued to faintly tremble, but relented after a few moments with a heavy sigh. This was it. There was no going back from this. She had to know. She had to get answers for all of these pieces that as of yet still refused to form any sort of clear picture. Even if she was now all too certain that what was coming would leave her reeling mentally all over again.

"Alright then…" She replied quietly, subconsciously turning a bit to better face Flowey.

It was clear Flowey himself was to be the one to share what they had been hiding. Likely for the best, seeing as it appeared it surrounded him most directly. Apart from that terrifying voice she'd heard from Frisk at least… which she still hoped would be addressed sooner rather than later with how it continued to plague her mind. But knowing just what the big, overwhelming secret was regarding Flowey was just as important and she gave him her full attention.

All the while, she fought back against the near choking dread as much as possible. It wanted so badly to overwhelm her even before anything was said, but she couldn't allow that. Even if it took nearly all her willpower to stay put and listen, she would. Her paws shook, but the rest of her remained rigid as she waited for her child to speak.

Flowey too seemed all too consumed by nerves and hesitation, but it was clear the urge to be done with this was even more consuming. He let out a strained sigh and then straightened up on his stem to better face her.

"Prepare yourself, because you're not going to like this first part." He warned, tone low.

Toriel just nodded, communicating she had expected as much. Flowey bit his lip for another moment with indecision, eyes narrowing in thought. But he pushed on with what needed to be said rather quickly. Quicker than Toriel expected,

"I don't think I need to remind you about your son Asriel that was killed by humans a long time ago, right?" He asked, expression darkening.

The question made her flinch despite herself. She… wasn't sure what she had been expecting, but it certainly wasn't that. But it wasn't like this was the first time someone had brought up the death of her children out of the blue. It certainly didn't help that their stories were such common knowledge.

"You… certainly do not." She replied, a trace of anger and pain leaking into her tone.

Flowey nodded and continued on, forcing the words out as though they would stick to his mouth otherwise.

"He absorbed the soul of your other, adopted, kid Chara after they died of self induced buttercup poisoning." He went on, as if that was something she was unaware of. "And together in their shared form, the two crossed the barrier only to be brutally killed by a village of humans nearby when they assumed the worst case scenario. After becoming gravely wounded, they staggered back home, only for their shared form to collapse into dust in the throne room."

Toriel grit her teeth a bit against a surge of fiery emotion that welled up from her soul in response to his words, not at all seeing what this was supposed to be accomplishing. And it was already starting to rob her of her composure.

"Yes Flowey… I am well aware of how my children perished." She all but growled despite herself, voice low and dark. "I do not see the point in-"

"I'm getting to that, promise." He cut her off, cowering backwards a bit from the intensity of her gaze.

His nerves seem to briefly rob him of his training of thought, and his eyes darted back and forth momentarily as he raced to reclaim it.

"Where was I…? Oh right, dust. The dust from the shared form spread over the throne room gardens… and…"

He paused, and Toriel noticed Frisk tense in anticipation beside the flower monster. She just waited, still struggling to restrain her spurred emotions and utterly lost as to what Flowey could possibly be getting at.

"Well... something… happened to that dust. Specifically the dust containing some shred of magical remnants of Asriel. Some of it uh… ended up on a flower. The first golden flower that grew before all the others. A flower that was eventually used in an… experiment."

She blinked, feeling her eyes widen. Something was starting to connect within her mind, something about the monster in front of her and the story being told, but it wasn't registering through everything else. But she had barely a moment to ponder anything concrete regarding these alleged experiments involving her son's remains and flowers could be before Flowey continued.

"So uh… Asriel. Well he…" He trailed off again for a moment, then sighed bitterly once more and seemed to decide to change tactics. "No... I… was brought back through that experiment..."

As he said those words, his face began to morph like it so often did when he intended to mock those whose visages he'd imitate. But this time, he was forming the face of someone he shouldn't know, someone he certainly shouldn't be able to reflect down to the most minute detail.

A short muzzle had emerged on his face, marked with small fangs and a flat mammalian nose. His entire center facial structure had gained a soft, furry appearance, down to a fuzzy tuft on his forehead. And most striking of all were a pair of brilliant green eyes, so familiar and dear to her that the sight of them was nearly too much for her soul to bear. He had even replicated the tiny detail of one of the fangs having an utterly overlookable, minuscule chip in the side. So small that one would truly have to be looking to spot it. Something no one besides her and Asgore should ever be able to remember.

There was no mistaking it. She was looking at the face of her long dead son, framed and encircled by golden petals like some kind of floral halo.

Despite her attempts to prepare herself for what the flower monster had intended to tell her, there was truly nothing that could of prepared her for this. She stared into those precious, beloved eyes and felt a horror and rage and pain so deep that it rendered her mind both frozen and burning white hot with emotion at the same time. So much so that the actual message he'd been meaning to deliver was all but lost as she was fully consumed by the sight before her. Her eyes had grown wide as dinner plates and her mouth fell open, trying in vain to form some semblance of words that wouldn't, couldn't come in that moment.

Nonetheless, Flowey continued speaking. And as he did, she was struck another devastating blow when it was not the flower monster's usual harsh, high pitched tone that met her ears, but the soft, youthful voice that matched the face he was presenting. And just like his visual imitation, the imitation of her son's voice was a truly perfect match. The only discrepancy being that he sounded far more listless and without emotion than she had ever heard from the usually warm and happy child.

"The experiment back then… it brought me back Mom…" He said, looking up at her with those damned, blessed eyes. "But it was without my soul… and I was stuck as a flower."

He glanced down bitterly at the stem that supported his mismatched face for a moment before meeting her eyes again, still seemingly unmoved by her anguished reaction.

"It all happened through some magical scientific experimentation and an injection of Determination." He explained, every word in that sweet voice she cherished, and every one tearing at her soul. "You can ask Alphys more about that, it's all her fault it happened. But I guess the details can uh… wait."

Then and only then, did he seem to grasp the severity of how Toriel was taking the situation. He gulped and shrank back slightly, no doubt feeling the intense waves of emotion coming from her soul. Now that the initial shock had had a moment to process, the deeply burning anger that Flowey would do something like this to intentionally distress her and twist at her emotions overwhelmed all other thoughts and feelings. The idea that her children had potentially both set out to pull such a truly insidious excuse of a prank…

Had she been in a better state of mind she would have realized just how unlikely that would be in Frisk's case at least, but she was far from in a good state of mind at that moment.

She gritted her teeth against a snarl and felt flames burn intensely inside her, utterly shaken from her intended mission with all this. She had to fight the magic flaring up from her soul and seeking passage to become fiery attacks. Her red eyes seemed to burn with that same intensity, yet darken dangerous all the same. Both of her children looked at her then with fear in their eyes, but neither fled or dropped the act even then.

She grasped at the frail remains of her self control and finally managed to speak, voice low, and shaking slightly from barely repressed emotion.

"Flowey… I demand you to stop this right this moment. That is not funny." She ordered, with all the authority of a former Queen and all the heartache of a grieving mother. "The fact you would seek to so callously torment me by imitating his face and voice like that…"

Flowey flinched somewhat, and the expression of frustration and hurt passed over the imitated face of her child, only adding to her chaotic emotions. And the awful pain in her head seemed to increase right along with it. Not at all helping the already dismaying situation.

"Mom… i'm not lying." Flowey retorted, an edge of pleading to his tone, and still in her son's voice. "I've… been here this whole time. As Flowey. I'm not who you remember me to be, but I am technically what remains of your son. I… I don't like acknowledging it... but I am Asriel… or at least what's left of him."

Every word from him was like a malicious blow to her soul, painful enough that she wouldn't be surprised if they were actually chipping away at her HP. She couldn't believe Flowey would do something like this, would go to such lengths to hurt her. This somehow felt worse than those timelines she'd relived where he'd killed her and toyed with her. This was malice on a whole other level, and she just couldn't understand it.

She'd held her son's ravaged form as he died, saw the light leave his eyes and cradled pawfuls of his dust as he crumbled away to nothing in her arms. Her son was dead, along with his human sibling who'd she'd buried with her own two paws. Now Flowey, a monster she had conceded to care for despite all his past actions, was invoking his image and trying to spin a story that could only seek to cause her renewed suffering. And Frisk had played along with it, willing to subject her to this.

This wasn't like what happened when Sans had told her of the Resets and timelines. This was beyond personal. Even with her earlier vows, there was no part of her that could even begin to consider Flowey's tale as anything else but utterly heartless lies beneath all the fiery agony burning within her.

She hadn't felt so betrayed and anguished since the day Asgore had declared his plans of genocide.

"STOP IT!" She all but screamed at him, cutting him off as her self control finally snapped and fell away.

She was suddenly on her feet, claws out, fangs bared, and flames curling out uncontrollably from the corner of her jaws. Flowey recoiled, and twisted her son's features into something truly fearful. But even still, he wouldn't drop the act. Her outcry had rendered the whole room silent again, the only sound being her uneven, heavy breathing. Though her rational thoughts had mostly failed her at that point, some modicum of awareness of the situation did return to her and she was able to at least swallow back the flames flaring up from her throat.

"Flowey I told you to stop this and I meant it!" She snarled, unable to keep the true force of her rage and pain from her voice. "You will cease this behavior at once! I will not stand here and listen to you mock my deceased son like this! How could you two be so cruel as to-"

This time, it was her who was cut off, as she felt a gentle tug on her sleeve. With a frustrated growl that rumbled deep in her throat, she whipped her head around to glare down at the child responsible. In her eyes during that terrible moment, they were an accomplice in all this, and just as deserving of bearing witness to her intense anger. But before she had even processed the fact that she was looking into a pair of bright, familiar, scarlet eyes rather than the usual soft brown, her child said something that reduced her back to shellshock within a moment.

"Mom… it really is him." Frisk said, though once again, it was layered with that other chilling voice from before.

She stared down at them with wide eyes once again, as her mind pushed through the frantic emotion to begin the connecting of impossible dots. Her denial and anger continued to be the loudest voice in her head, but it could not drown out the realizations that her more rational side was making. Her child spoke on, double voice and all.

"It's both of us. We were brought back." They insisted, red eyes boring into her. "We've… been back for a long time."

Toriel couldn't move, or speak a reply. Her reasonings and explanations were rapidly failing her and crumbling away just like her children's combined form had all those years ago. But she still pushed back fiercely against the new reality that was taking shape in her mind and right in front of her, unable to accept it or even comprehend the idea of it.

"Please Mom… I know you recognize my voice… my eyes... I want you to say it." Her child openly begged her as they gripped her arm tight.

Tears gathered in those ruby red eyes, so very much like her own and yet still so very unique. Toriel could only continue to stare for a few intense moments, where she may have felt a million emotions at once. But once the moment passed, something within her soul smashed up against the walls of her agonized denial. It made her finally see clearly what she had known within herself to be true since the moment she had overheard that voice overlayed with Frisk's.

"... Char...a …?" She croaked out, feeling her entire body go cold as she did so.

All at once, she found herself on her knees again, staring at her child as if seeing them for the first time in her life. Her mind was in a whirlwind, blood was roaring in her ears, but she had spoken the name aloud, and could not take it back.

Frisk… Chara… The child in front of her. They smiled a watery smile, and passed their sleeve over their eyes before speaking again. The relief and happiness they felt at her response poured off their soul enough that she could feel it. But the warmth and joy it contained could not penetrate her own soul's practically frozen state. She didn't know what to do, what to think. Nothing in her mind seemed to be working at all.

"Yeah… it's me." They confirmed yet again, tearing down her emotional state even further. "In my case, I was asleep for a long time… or something like that. But when Frisk fell down above where you buried me… I guess I… woke up. I think it was their Determination and something to do with both of us having the same soul color. But my spirit has been attached to them since then. I've been with them since their first Reset, sharing their body and soul. You could even say all our Resets were a... dual effort."

They smiled a sad smile at that, looking at her for a reaction. But their expression fell when they realized Toriel wasn't truly listening. Indeed, all that they had said had been heard but refused to be absorbed, accepted. This was... It just… she couldn't

She covered her face with her paws, suddenly unable to look at them. It was as she did so that she became aware of how badly she was shaking. Her rage was gone, stolen by the chill instilled in her from hearing the voices of her long deceased children, and of seeing the cruel imitations of their faces. It was too much. It had hollowed her out emotionally leaving only despair and desperation in its wake.

"Children s-stop… please…" She begged them, feeling her claws dig into her forehead. "This heartless ch-charade has... It has gone t-too far."

She heard something of an exasperated groan from Flowey, followed by a mutter of something akin to "I told you this would happen." Still in her dear Asriel's voice. Char-Fri- whoever stood before her ignored him though, and Toriel felt them gently try and pull her paws down away from her face.

"Mom, I promise, it's not a trick or anything like that." They insisted, emotion and determination evident in their voice. "Please look at me, you know I'm not lying."

That statement sent her mind reeling again, spinning off in frantic directions that offered no escape from what her child was implying. Still, she refused to uncover her face and look at them, not sure her soul could bear another moment of staring into those agonizingly familiar red and green eyes. And stars above, how her head ached. Still, the determined human didn't falter in their attempts to get through to her. They quickly came up with a new approach, speaking in a softer voice that attempted to reason with her currently thoroughly unreasonable mind.

"You used to sit up with me for hours when I couldn't sleep and wanted to hurt myself." They calmly reminded her, tone becoming heavier at the mention of those events. "You would heal me up when I did and then put colorful band aids on the marks. I liked the ones with the dogs on them best. You learned how to make chocolate bars just to try and cheer me up, but I always complained they weren't as good as the name brand ones. You taught me how to properly brush my hair for the first time in my life, but I always tried to get you to do it for me anyway because I liked how it felt. You taught me how to sew so I could make Dad that sweater for his birthday."

Toriel heard every word, and practically saw each memory play out in her mind as vividly as the day she'd lived them. Every one of them was a personal memory she had shared with Chara. Little things that were never general knowledge to the public. There was no way any imposter could possibly know all of that. But still, she couldn't bring herself to move. Her mind still felt just as locked up beneath the pain and tempest of emotions. And yet, still just as determined, her child persisted.

"Azzy, say something that only you would know." They said, directing the demand towards Flowey.

"I told you not to call me that." Flowey growled irritibly in reply, the sound seeming so alien when coming from her son's voice. "But fine fine…"

There was a brief shuffle of feet, and then Flowey's voice spoke up from right in front of her, indicating that her human child- whoever that may be at this point- was holding him.

"When I was four, I once lit your favorite apron on fire just because I was angry that you wouldn't let me have a whole slice of pie when Dad got to have three all to himself." He started, in a more hesitant tone than Chara, but one that softened by degrees as he went on.

"Sometimes I stole your eyeliner to draw cool stripes on my face and used your shawls as capes just to pose in the mirror. I lost my first tooth because I tripped over Dad's watering can and face planted into a chunk of marble. I named my stuffed monster that you sewed me Patches, and had to have him to sleep the first few years of my life. And the morning before I absorbed Chara's soul, I accidentally spilled your coffee all over the kitchen floor... and never got to apologize for it."

He paused, and then continued on in a tone that was almost wistful or fond. In her mind's eye, she could picture Asriel speaking to match the voice she was hearing.

"And… you used to always rub my ears and hum a lullaby to me to help me sleep. I can still remember how it went."

A soft sort of hum escaped him then, testing and briefly fumbling with the notes before managing to get out the main first verse. He wasn't exactly that musically inclined, but the effort he put into was enough to make the point stick.

"You're still tone deaf as hell bro." Her child teased him, and this time it was primarily Chara's voice she heard.

Flowey sputtered in embarrassment and anger before retaliating to the insult.

"SHUT UP CHARA!" He shouted, resulting in a snicker from the human in question.

It was so very much… like them. Just like the small squabbles the two would get into over a century ago. It was a bit harsher than those times, granted, but still, the familiarity within their banter was unmistakable…

Slowly, she finally summoned up the mental fortitude to uncover her eyes and face the phantoms of her past there before her. She could hardly see through the tears building up in her eyes, or focus through the now persistent pain in her head, but she could still make out their faces. They were not the fully realized visages of her children like she could pull from her dreams and memories, merely what they could seemingly manage to present from what remained of them. But in that moment, she finally could see them for who they truly were.

Her long lost children were alive… By the stars above, they were alive. Asriel and Chara were ALIVE, right here in front of her. They had been here with her all along, and she had been oblivious. There was... no other explanation. Unless this all turned out to be some obscenely cruel dream, and she was actually passed out drunk on the bench outside at that very moment, with her broken mind and aching soul concocting visions of her deepest desires.

But no... this wasn't a dream. She knew what her dreams felt like at this stage. This was no vision of a timeline passed. Not to mention the pain from her resulting headaches were never detectable whilst she slept like it was now. And the things being said by her children… they were old, buried memories she had subconsciously blocked out long ago due to trauma. These were reminders of things she could recall, but not remember with the full detail as they were recounting. This was nothing any dream or imposter could hope to pull off.

No one else could know all these things. No one could so perfectly imitate their voices and features to this degree. They… really were right there in front of her. Logically she knew it was impossible… it should be impossible! She had held her son as he crumbled to dust, she had cradled Chara's cold body and buried them with her own two paws. Even with the explanations they offered… for them to be alive in any capacity still felt wholly, utterly unthinkable.

But then again… she'd thought the same of the Resets at first, had she not?

"My children…?" She croaked out, her voice just over a whisper as she lifted her paws towards their blurry forms. "You... I…"

There was only one other word that she could get out through the swirl of disbelief and emotion, one word that dominated all others, even with what she already had been told.

"How…?"

Despite the brokenness in her tone, she could see through the haze of tears that her children were smiling at her with relief. Even Fl-Asr- … her son, looked to be pleasantly surprised by her managing to accept what was happening. But it was Chara, now faintly understood to be in control of Frisk's body, who stepped over took her paw with their small hands. Two sets of red eyes met, and neither could manage to stay dry in that moment.

"We can explain more in a bit, and hopefully everything eventually. I know you need time to uh… process all this." They said, voice shaking slightly as they fought against the urge to cry, just as Toriel remembered they often did. "But uh… right now... we should just..."

They trailed off, and after another moment of apparently holding themself back, they suddenly rushed forward and hugged her for all they were worth. They gathered fistfuls up of her nightgown in their hands and held on to her as tightly as they could, as though some part of them feared she would suddenly disappear. As though this was the first time they'd hugged her in over a century… During the process, Flowey was all but dropped and squished between them both, leaving him groaning in annoyance yet again.

Toriel could only remain where she was, leaving the embrace feeling rather one sided as her arms remained stiff at her sides in the same position. She truly felt frozen, even as the blessedly warm emotions from her child's powerful soul met her own in a consistent reassurance. A soul she now knew represented the emotions of both of her human children.

"I've... w-wanted to hug you and Dad again for so long." Chara said after a moment, sniffling once and cursing under their breath. "Screw it, I don't care anymore if saying that makes me sound stupid. I blame Frisk damn it. Their soul is so damn sentimental, and I have to share every sappy emotion they feel."

After continuing to cling to her rigid form for a few moments more, Toriel felt them shift a little and free one arm in order to reach down and pull the flower monster smooshed between them up more properly into the hug.

"Asriel get your floral ass over here." Chara demanded, though not without a touch of humor to it. "You don't get to play tough guy anymore if I can't."

She felt her son's petals brush against her cheek as he was tucked against her within the crook of Chara's arm. He bristled with indignation at his sibling's words with an another irritated huff.

"I literally can't feel Chara, I don't have a-" He started strong, presenting the statement with his usual sour attitude whilst using Asriel's gentler voice, but after a moment he faltered and appeared to then deflate in defeat with a sigh.

Reluctantly it seemed, a pair of cautious vines steadily joined Chara's arms in embracing her. They didn't squeeze tight like they had in all those recalled memories where he had hurt her with them. They simply lightly wrapped their way around her and hung mostly limp once he had a grip. Still, the sensation didn't help the already chaotic mess that her mind currently was.

"Whatever…" Flowey grumbled, but the emotions behind it betrayed more beyond his front of apathy.

For another few moments Toriel remained frozen there, still trying to grasp a fraction of what was happening. But eventually, she slowly, shakily, began to close her arms around her long lost children. Finally holding them again after more than a century of grieving their loss. A loss that had torn their family apart and caused the downward spiral of both of their parents. A loss that had all but defined her for so so long.

Little things were starting to click into place more noticeably as she tightened her grip by degrees. Flowey's strange fascination with her and Asgore's relationship, his recent request to be referred to as her child, those moments when she saw flickers of her son's features or mannerisms from the flower monster, all the secrecy and pitying looks from Sans regarding his true identity. Now in hindsight, it all seemed so clear. No wonder he addressed her with such disgust during that one memory… What kind of mother would be so blind as to not recognize her own son, simply in a new form?

And on Chara's side, some deep part of her had known that it was their voice she had heard mixed with Frisk's from the very beginning. And she had always made silent comparisons between Frisk and the child she lost, especially when Frisk seemed to go through periods of inexplicable personality shifts. In which they gained a personality that was unmistakably displaying many of Chara's own traits, even the ones generally at odds with Frisk.

Their sharing a body also explained how and why their eyes glowed red in her dreams and her child's inexplicable ability to traverse the dangers of the Underground in comparison to the other fallen children. Frisk had had a guide, one that knew their former home all too well, even with all the time that had passed since they had last been "awake".

It was all falling into place. Even if she had no hope of truly processing any of it in the state she was in. So instead of trying to understand the logistics of what was happening, she did all she could to direct her focus towards what was important.

The how here didn't matter. All that truly mattered was that her children were by some miracle alive again. She could sort out the inordinate number of questions, implications and past lies piling up later. Right now, she just needed to relish in the fact that they were here with her after she had been tormented by the grief of their loss for over a century.

But as soon as the tides in her mind truly began to shift from shock and disbelief to the spark of joy expected, her headache flared up again. Only this time it was worse than it had ever been before. Like some enormous weight was suddenly bearing down on her skull at full force.

The abrupt pain and disorientation was so intense that she recoiled back from her children and ended up sitting on the floor clutching at her head again. A confused, strained sound of pain escaped her as she did so, clearly startling her children even more than they already had been.

"Mom? What's wrong?!" She heard both Chara's and Frisk's voices clearly then, even as the pain began to make her head swim.

She couldn't answer. Something was wrong, terribly terribly wrong. But she didn't know how to vocalize it. For a brief moment, she thought it was the alcohol in her system causing some bad reaction in combination with her stress. But no, this was something far worse. The pain was unlike anything she had ever experienced, making her grit her teeth together until they ached down to the root. But beyond that, flashes of images were beginning to obscure her vision and consume her mind in momentary bursts. They came so fast that she could hardly even perceive what they portrayed before they were replaced with another. And another and another, an endless deluge of sights and sounds that were all vaguely recognizable, but all the more chaotic.

She saw flashes of the other fallen children, of Flowey, of Frisk. She saw herself being killed again and again by the two of them, she saw a glimpse of what could only be the true first time she'd ever seen the surface again, she saw herself despondent and back on the throne, she saw herself facing a mob of angry monsters calling for her banishment, she saw herself losing control of her flames… and accidentally striking Frisk down in a moment of desperation and despair.

Endless visions detached from any context or meaning. All screaming and tearing through her mind without mercy.

It seemed the underlying truth of the mysterious headaches that had been afflicting her was finally coming to a head. It felt as though something was coming undone within her mind. Or rather, it was like a dam holding something immense back had finally shattered. These continual headaches she'd been dealing with had only been the cracks, but this… this was the full collapse. Whatever was happening to her, it wasn't good. It wasn't normal. And it certainly wasn't something that should be happening even in this situation.

She could faintly feel her children touching her, shaking her, trying to snap her out of whatever had consumed her. But her affliction would not be banished so easily. She was steadily losing her awareness of what was happening around her to the barrage of visions that just kept coming every moment.

"Ugh, I told you idiots that this would be a bad idea!" Flowey snapped, voice slipping between his usual voice and Asriel's voice.

His exclamation sounded as though it was coming from far away, muffled by the rising pitch of the ringing in her ears. If Chara, Frisk or both responded, she didn't hear it. Her senses were dulling rapidly as lightheadedness set in.

"I…" She tried to croak out a response, but it withered and died after that one syllable.

Before she even realized what was happening, she was hitting the floor hard, collapsing on her side as her children had no hope of keeping her upright. She could distantly hear the voices of her children, all three of her children, calling out to her, and calling out for help. Including help from a certain skeleton they all knew was listening. Their cries grew duller and duller, as did her vision. But one voice still managed to break through whatever was stealing away her consciousness.

"tori!" Sans called out to her as he manifested at her side in an instant, the panicked desperation in his voice coming through.

But she was far beyond the point where she could properly respond, and if he did or said anything more, it was lost to the chaos overtaking her mind.

Her scarlet eyes glazed over. The only thing she could seem to direct any meager focus towards beyond the agony was what had happened before this affliction had overtaken her. Her long lost children were alive… and whatever was happening to her… it was trying to steal her from them once again. Just like her dreams had done… and how that group of misguided humans had so long ago...

"Cha...raAs...ri...el…" She choked out her children's names and moved her paws in a vain attempt to feel for them, all near subconscious acts.

After that, there were a few moments where all she felt was pain, and the endless barrage of images and sounds were the sole things she could perceive.

Then there was only darkness and silence.

The last thought that managed to manifest in her mind before all awareness washed away, was that the sensation she was feeling was quite similar to all the times she now remembered dying.