Chapter 18: Second Chance
AN: There's only about two more chapters after this! Hope you enjoy.
"Frisk," you heard a voice gently sing-song your name. "Wake up, Frisk, y'hear?" You blinked your eyes open, wincing at the brightness of the room around you. You saw Onionsan leaning nervously over you, eyes lighting up when they met yours. "Flowey, Flowey! They're finally awake!" He called excitedly.
Your last memory being the two of them fighting, this made you smile. "Didn't take you two long to make up, eh?" You joked hoarsely. Onionsan made a face at that. "What?" You questioned.
"You were out for almost a day," you heard Flowey voice from several feet away.
"Oh," you chortled, attempting to sit up. It felt like you had regained quite a bit of your strength. Waving off Onionsan's tentacles trying to aid you in standing up, you set your feet on the floor, using the bed they had laid you in to prop yourself up. Your legs seemed stable enough.
"I hope you don't mind, I took the liberty of detoxing as much of the excess determination from your body as I could." Flowey explained as he slithered towards you, drawing your soul out as he did so. You gasped at the sight of it, red heart beating at a regular, almost normal pace, purple splotches turned to a light gray undertone and no longer looking like a melted mushroom.
"Don't overdo it through, y'hear?" Onionsan advised, obviously worried. "There's still quite a bit of healing your body has left to do."
"Relax, Onionsan," Flowey blew him off, "She's been through worse. Right, Frisk?"
You saw Onionsan begin to redden. Before he could yell at Flowey, however, he grew pale almost instantaneously, dripping more than you had seen him ooze before on the tiles. Urgently, you and Flowey helped him crawl on top of one of the beds. Out of nowhere, the other abominations grouped around him (it looked as if they had been spying from behind the wall to the next corridor). Doggo and Astigmatism began to check him over, Gyftrot soothingly whispering words of encouragement to him while he murmured in pain. Stepping back as not to crowd the group of troubled monsters, you caught Tsunderplane out of the corner of your eye pulling Flowey to the side. Not wanting any fights to break out, you started to jog over to them, but stopped. What you witnessed shocked you; Flowey reached out a vine to Tsunderplane's beaten wing and patted it lightly. The bruised monster, as if accepting the flower's apology, dipped its nose slightly into Flowey's touch. You smiled at the sight, thankful that all your hard work was finally paying off and that both Flowey and the remaining monsters underground were choosing not to fight. You only wished Sans and Papyrus were here to see it with you.
After a second glance around, you noticed Mad Dummy looking on disapprovingly from a distance, head dipping as if he were hurt as well. Startled by your observation, you quickly eyeballed the other monsters for similar signs of decay. Sure enough, they too were in a worse condition that the last you had seen them. Unnerved, you limped over to where Flowey and Tsunderplane stood as onlookers against the wall.
"Flowey," you whispered, grabbing both the monster's attention. "I need to speak with you." A glance at Tsunderplane prompted you to add, "Alone." You didn't want to make any of them paranoid, especially after Flowey's newfound change of heart.
Once you were sure that the others were out of earshot, you hurriedly asked, "You haven't done anything to them since the first time, did you?" You hoped your implication didn't offend him too much.
Unfortunately, it did, and he vocalized it as such. "Are you accusing me? Of course not! I mean, not after I first... you know, I-"
"No, no, I'm not. It's okay, I know." You shushed him, not wanting to discourage him. "That's not what I meant. Look at them." You waited as Flowey glanced around. "Their bodies, they're decomposing, aren't they?"
Eyes widening, Flowey gasped. "Oh no, oh fuck no," he panted frantically, "I forgot about this. Damnit!" he cursed, hitting himself in the head with a particularly spiky vine.
"Flowey," you addressed him, taking the vine away from him and bruising your finger in the process. "Look at me." You commanded assertively, ignoring your now bleeding hand. "It's good that you feel bad, but now is not the time, and beating yourself up about this won't do any good right now. Listen, we need to find a way to stop this, and quick."
"Okay," the flower whispered, breathing slowly growing more steady. "Back before Alphys made me, she injected determination into several monster bodies."
"Yes, I remember."
"Okay." He nodded and continued, still in a whisper. "She never found a solution, but they lived. This isn't just determination, though. This is...worse."
Not wanting to make him relive what he had put them through, you nodded, and asked him what else he had given them.
With a sigh, Flowey ticked off on his petals, "Poisonous flower concoctions, faulty remedies, bacterial implants from fungus, rotten..." He trailed off, looking down defeated before he continued even quieter than before, "rotten steaks, about six months old, and dust."
You felt bad for Flowey as well as the monsters. Pushing the sick feeling in your stomach to the back of your mind, you refocused. "Flowey, do you have any sort of monster antibiotic?"
Flowey nodded, looking up at you ashamedly. "Yes, and I know they're not sick from the meat. Only Onionsan got sick when that happened, and he got over it in a week. I checked for any other signs, there was none."
"Okay, good." You confirmed. "Make the flower antidotes and get the antibiotics. The materials are in the fridge, yes?" He nodded once more, and you continued. "Good. We'll take it from there."
Not a moment after Flowey receded into the ground, Mad Dummy came up to you. "What was that all about?" He hissed.
"We're going to try to fix you all," you replied. "And before you claim you don't trust Flowey, know that he feels bad, and that as long as I'm here he won't cause you any more harm."
"I know." Mad Dummy muttered, and you turned to look at him. His eyes were sincere. "I'm not as in the dark as you think I am, human. You just watch yourself."
You nodded, and he gave you one last glare as he skulked away. You sighed, watching the mess of sick monsters huddle around each other, hoping you all could find a way out of this mess. Hope was on the rise, so with a little determination, you were sure it was possible.
Onionsan had had a fever, was the consensus of the other monsters. However, once Flowey delivered them all the antidotes that they needed, his temperature had gone down and they all looked (and smelled) a lot better. The welts had begun to heal almost immediately, and the ooze began to fall to the floor and stay there rather than continuously follow them around. They still appeared a little rough around the edges, but you could tell they were all grateful to the two of you.
"The rest of it," Flowey whispered to you afterwards, pulling you to the side once more, "It's determination."
You bit your lip, thinking. "I would say we could use the DT Extraction Machine, but I have no idea how to calibrate it or whatever."
"Me neither." Nervously, he chuckled as you stared at him, dumbfounded. "I actually don't know much about all this, I just take what was used on me and go based on that. Honestly, I'm mostly guessing on everything I do." Again you stared at him, and again he laughed. "Maybe they deserve to stay like this? They'll live."
You continued to stare at him. "After all this, are you serious? I'd say if you deserve a second chance, they do too."
With a sigh, Flowey agreed. "Yeah, and I did do far worse to them than they did to me."
"That's not the point." You said, kneeling to place your hands on the sides of his face. Making eye contact, you continued. "Your life matters just as much as anyone else's, and you have the same potential to change and better yourself just like me. You hear me?"
With a small smile, Flowey nodded. "Thank you, Frisk. For everything."
You returned his smile. "Good. Now are you sure there's no other option than the DT Machine?"
"Well," he began, "There is one thing, but I'm pretty sure Sans took it."
A light went off in your head, and you gently but hastily yanked the Legendary Artifact out of your pocket. Watching as Flowey's face lit up, you playfully asked, "Is this what you're talking about?" before following an eager reformed flower to heal the remaining monsters underground.
AN: Yeah, this is a short and sweet addition, but there's still a few unresolved things. Please review, I feel like these last few chs were a little cheesy, though this fic could use some happy.