Just Like Old Times
After Frisk awoke from the power nap, he looked around himself. Flowey was nowhere to be seen. He must still be with Papyrus.
While Alphys enjoyed her anime collection, Undyne had found a new love. She was glued to the TV, gleefully smashing the buttons on the game controller. On the screen, a pale white figure with red markings was running around roaring and swinging a pair of fiery blades at his enemies. She held the controller in a variety of positions as she slashed, hacked, and bludgeoned her way through each stage.
"This... THIS is something I'll never get tired of!" She leaned forward intently, now repeatedly mashing a button and watching the character trap and mercilessly pummel an enemy. "This is even more fun than being in the Royal Guard!"
"Hey Undyne," called a voice. "Can we talk for a second?"
Undyne glared in the direction of the voice. "No! I'm busy getting revenge!"
Upstairs, Frisk gave a small smile at Alphys. "It's okay. We can tell her later."
Alphys listened as Frisk laid out his ideas. Her expression slowly brightened.
"W-well, I... I'm really glad you did this! And, I think... I think if anyone can help him, it's you. Uhh... I feel weird asking. Especially after... you know. But... is there anything I can do to help?"
"Yeah, there is. Just do the same thing. Be a friend to him too." He paused for a moment. "It's going to be different this time. No experiments. No injections. No machines. No laboratory. Nothing like that."
"Yeah..."
Frisk thought for a moment. "By the way, I need to find something for him to do. He can't just sit on the table all day. He will be bored out of his mind."
"That's... that's a good question. Well, um... Undyne is enjoying video games. How about that?"
Frisk nodded. "That's an idea. Think you can design some kind of controller or something he could use?"
"Sure! That's no problem. I'll get right on it."
It wasn't long before Alphys had a workable device that would allow Flowey to interface with a computer screen. The real question was, what would Flowey want to play?
What would Asriel want to play?
The juxtaposition between the two was clear. Asriel was loving, nurturing. Flowey was destructive. Asriel liked to grow things. Flowey loved wielding power unfairly. Frisk had seen both.
Suddenly, he had an idea.
Later that day, Frisk and Alphys busily worked at hooking up a computer next to Flowey's pot. The computer was old, but still functional. It was unable to access the Internet, but could still run several programs.
"I want you to try something, Flowey. Here. Let me get you set up."
"I made this for you, Flowey. Try it out." Alphys hooked up a small interface to one of Flowey's leaves. Once the computer booted up, Flowey found he was able to move the mouse around via the interface. He was also able to input letters where necessary.
"Huh. Okay." Flowey experimented with the device, watching the pointer move and respond across the screen.
Frisk nodded, satisfied. "It works? Good. Now... I put a game on here for you. I want you to play it and tell me what you think. I think you'll like it." He booted the software up. "If you really don't like it, just tell me. I'll find something else for you."
"What kind of game is it?"
Frisk's hand sat on top of the monitor. "This game lets you build and run a city." He loaded it. The program popped up. A musical jingle. Then a menu screen. The title of the game displayed in large, colorful letters.
Flowey's face contorted as he looked at it. "'SimpleCity'?"
Frisk walked Flowey through some of the basics. Where to go to start a new city. How to load a city. Where to open a scenario, which contains a problem that needs to be solved.
"Now... how you play this is your choice. There's no right or wrong way. Play around with it, and tell me what you think, okay?"
"Okay..." He worked the mouse pointer. This actually did look interesting. "Er... Frisk. I have a question. Why is it called that? It doesn't look simple to me."
"Exactly. It's kind of like a joke." Frisk winked. "Now, I'll leave you alone. I need to go help Alphys with something."
Flowey experimented with the program. This was new, and different. He hadn't seen this before. After he familiarized himself with the controls, he loaded a scenario. A dialogue box popped up begging the new mayor to help control the rampant crime in the city. There were too few police departments and not nearly enough funding for the ones that were there. Newly-elected Mayor Flowey had to do something to make the streets crime-free again.
How to stop crime? That was easy. Flowey already knew the answer. He immediately went to the disaster menu and selected one disaster after another. Within seconds, monsters and aliens rampaged through the city, earthquakes ravaged it, floods devastated it. Rioters spilled out into the streets. Within a short amount of time, the city was in flames. The population dwindled to nothing.
A big grin crossed Flowey's face. No more crime.
He found that this was also a good solution to pollution. Traffic congestion. Unemployment. High housing costs. And especially, boredom. Solving problems created by humans was easy. The same rule applied in every situation.
Kill or be killed.
Frisk was right. This was fun. He played it over and over.
Each time, after he finished, he would reset the game. And do it again.
Just like old times, too.
In the basement, Undyne was being given the news. Alphys and Frisk explained their thoughts.
"I see. So... you want that flower to be part of the club too, huh?" She looked at them blankly. "I just can't even believe you would have a crazy idea like that. I don't know what goes through that head of yours when you come up with these things, Frisk. You want to know what I think?" Her mouth turned up into a grin. "I think it's a great idea. I'm behind you one hundred percent."
Frisk gave a soft chuckle. "Thanks, Undyne."
"Don't worry about him. I'll keep him safe, okay?" She then sneered. "But, you'd better be right about this! Or else!"
Flowey busied himself with the game until it started to become repetitive. Before long, he had seen it all. What else was there?
Maybe if he tried something different. Maybe...
The cursor hovered over the "new game" selection on the menu. Tentatively, he created a new map.
A large, blank land mass stared at him from the screen. His expression was just as blank as he looked over it. Suddenly, he had no idea what to do. He spent so much time destroying cities. How do you build one? Where do you put everything? Taking wild guesses, he haphazardly threw down some roads. He zoned a few areas.
Will it work?
What if it doesn't grow? What if it grows a little, and then dies? What if he makes things worse? What if the people end up hating him? What if the whole thing turns into a mess that he'll have to clean up later?
What was the point anyway? Didn't he have anything better to do?
Flowey read the built-in tutorials. He tried building something. Anything. He failed several times. His city didn't grow. He forgot to provide water. He didn't have enough power. He ran out of money over and over again. He laid down large patches of zoning, hoping to attract citizens.
But nobody came.
This was useless. And boring.
Then he tried again. And again. And then. Eventually. A few houses popped up. Then a few more. Then a few stores. Then cars could be seen on the streets. He built. And stumbled. And built. And screwed up. And built. He responded to citizens' demands. He managed problems.
Over time, after much trial and error, persistence, and especially determination, his fledgling village grew into a large metropolis. He built more buildings, grew the economy, kept the people safe. The citizens were happy. Soon, he couldn't expand any more. He had already filled up the whole map with thousands of buildings containing hundreds of thousands of happy people.
He was doing a fine job as mayor. The citizens loved him. Even if it was fake digital love, it must have counted for something. He actually found himself pleased with his success. And in the process, he was learning about cities and how they work.
Looking over his creation, he rubbed his leafy arms together.
The cursor hovered over the disaster menu. He clicked on the choices. One by one.
Due to the sheer size of the city, it took longer this time. But not much longer. Within moments, the entire city was in flames.
Frisk dug around and found a few other, similar simulation games, and loaded them onto Flowey's machine. But Flowey kept returning to the same one. He became preoccupied with it. He was adept at building cities. He would also bristle with excitement whenever his cities became large enough to completely smash into pieces.
Increasingly, however, he found himself more and more concerned with solving the cities' problems. Slowly but surely, he forgot about the disaster menu. He wanted to watch the cities grow.
Someone had to take care of those cities.
Frisk passed by the table upon which Flowey was sitting. Flowey banged a leaf against the edge of his pot.
"Frisk... I don't understand this. This is stupid."
"What is?"
Flowey gestured at the screen. "These idiots. They want you to build things that pollute. Then they complain about pollution." He huffed. "SimpleCity indeed. They are simple-minded fools."
"Yeah. It's true. People are difficult sometimes." Frisk tried not to laugh.
Nobody liked sitting in the house forever. Life couldn't be all about games and TV. They made frequent excursions outside. Either to take long walks, or tour and see different places in the city (usually in Papyrus' new car). As often as possible, Frisk took Flowey along. Flowey occasionally made snide comments regarding things he noticed along the way, but for the most part, found himself intrigued by the new world he was being shown.
They saw buildings. Forests. Beaches. People. There was always something else to see, something new and different around every corner. Flowey got to ride on a train for the first time. Then later, a ferry.
It was particularly rainy one day. That wasn't going to stop them. Together with his friends, Frisk stepped into the elevator in the major metropolitan building. He held Flowey close to him as well.
The elevator rumbled. It went up dozens of stories, until it finally hit the top. The bell dinged. They stepped out, and were greeted by an expansive, panoramic view of the entire city.
Mist still hung in the air from the rain. A rainbow was visible off in the distance, and the sun was cutting through the clouds. They could also see the beach, forest, Mount Ebott. In contrast to the relatively confined Underground, the landscape on the surface seemed to stretch on forever. On the bucolic outskirts of the metropolitan center, they could see many smaller houses and villages clustered about.
"It's... it's a pretty nice view up here, huh?" Alphys looked over the many buildings down below.
"A nice change of pace," chimed in Undyne.
Papyrus leaned over the edge of the building. "THEY LOOK LIKE ANTS DOWN THERE!"
Frisk held Flowey up so he could get a better view. "What do you think?"
"It's, uh... big." Flowey looked over the many buildings. "It's different."
"Yeah. This is just one city out of thousands too, you know."
Flowey was perplexed at his new life. Things weren't supposed to go this way. He wasn't supposed to be there. But nobody seemed to care about that. It was just the way it was.
They were always diligent about watering him, feeding him, and putting him somewhere where he had sunlight. Or, at the very least, a sun lamp.
Alphys decided she wanted a sun lamp for herself.
Frisk periodically asked him how he was feeling. Flowey always scoffed in return. Frisk didn't mind, and always reminded him that someone cared about him.
Around the house, they played music. Flowey didn't like all of it. But he found he liked some of it. He responded especially well to slower, classical music, and eventually asked Frisk for a way to listen to more of it.
It wasn't long before Undyne found herself bored fighting against computer opponents. She knew all their tricks by now. She wanted a real challenge. Someone unpredictable. It didn't take her long to settle on her next adversary.
After Flowey was able to be hooked up to the game console, she pummeled him repeatedly. Interspersed with her numerous overwhelming victories were also bits of encouragement. Flowey was determined to beat her. After enough practice, he turned out to be a formidable opponent. More and more often, he rubbed his victories in her face.
What was happening to him? It was hard for him to place the feeling. Was he actually starting to have fun?
When he was bored with the entertainment, he asked for reading material. He wanted to know more. He learned about the immediate area he was in. Then, gradually, he started to learn about other places. Other times. Whereas before, he learned about the history of the Underground, now he was learning about the history of the surface.
Though he was no stranger to violence, he found himself wondering how much of that violence was really necessary.
Humans are weird.
Sometimes on clear nights, he wanted to be placed outside under the stars. They were in stark contrast to the stars he knew in the Underground. As they didn't live near city lights, he saw the vastness of the universe more clearly. He had no idea it was so huge. Before long, he took an interest in science. Then he wanted to learn other things. He devoured information about all kinds of subjects, left and right.
What was he going to do with this information? Well, it really didn't matter.
You should go back, Flowey. Haven't you had enough yet? Go back to where you really belong.
Flowey paused. Then, he kept reading.
What was there to go back to, exactly?
The changes were not unnoticed by Frisk. He sat in his room, with Alphys sitting across from him.
"I'm really surprised, Frisk. He seems... I dunno. How can I describe it?"
"Happier?"
"Y-yeah! Happier." She fidgeted. "I was never able to do this. I mean... I tried different things, and all, when I tried to help him, but..."
Frisk stared out the window at the stars. His head was propped up in his hands. "Alphys... I don't know if he can come back. Maybe Asriel is gone forever. Maybe this is the best we'll be able to do for him. But if he's happy..." He turned to face Alphys. "Is there more you can ask for? Does anything else really matter?"
"Y-yeah..." Alphy's eyes were wet. "Frisk, I'm still glad we were able to do this for him. I even feel better now than I did before." She sighed softly. "You're such a good friend. I'm... I'm glad we got to work together on this."
"I couldn't have done it without you, Alphys."
They approached each other and exchanged a hug.
A few moments went by. Then Frisk picked up something off of his desk. "Oh, by the way. I got you a present. It's your birthday, right?"
Alphys blinked. "Uhh... no."
"Well, happy birthday anyway. Here." He handed Alphys a DVD.
Alphys paused, holding the case in her hand. "Studio Glibly?" She turned it over, looking at the cover artwork. It was colorful and elegant. The run time for this movie was 135 minutes. Quite a far cry from the series of 30 minute long shorts she was accustomed to. "Hmm. This... this looks interesting. T-thanks Frisk!"
"You're welcome. I thought you would like it. Be sure to tell me what you think."
"I definitely will!"