Chapter Four: Souls

"Howdy, bastard! Shouldn't you be at a party?

sans shrugged on shoulder easily enough. He stopped before Flowey, the two lit by the dying evening light. It was true that he was expected at the party for Frisk, but he wondered if the offer still stood after what he had said to her. It wouldn't stop him from showing up later, but he decided to be late, and planned this stop, first.

"hello, flowey," sans replied now. "shouldn't you be dead?"

Flowey grinned. "Yes, but only one thing keeps me alive."

"Frisk forbidding me from killing you?" sans supplied, raising a hand, winking one socket.

Flowey laughed derisively. "That's your reason for not killing me? You've grown soft."

sans took another step forward slowly. As he did, his eyes lost their pinpoints, becoming empty, void sockets. His grin widened. "Then I have grown soft," he said, his voice felt more than heard, as opposite as his normal voice as anything could be. "Luckily for you, Prince Asriel."

"Can we talk for a bit?" Frisk asked Alphys, surprising her. It was at a lull in the party, thanks to Mettaton's karaoke singing - and dancing. Both Toriel and Asgore shared dark glares as they cleaned up burnt out speakers and cleaned up the mess he left behind, while Undyne yelled at Mettaton, who was also yelling back. A pretty normal lull, really.

Alphys and Papyrus were the only ones sitting normally, the two playing an intense round of Smash Brothers. When Papyrus won for the third time in a row, Alphys threw her controller and sulked. This was when Frisk decided to break in with her question.

"Sure, Frisk," Alphys said at once, getting to her feet and shooting Papyrus a dark look. "I was done, anyway."

Papyrus cackled at this. "NYEH-HEH-HEH-HEH! I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, HAVE FINALLY BESTED THE PRESTIGIOUS DOCTOR ALPHYS AT SOMETHING!"

Alphys paused, then smiled deviously, turning back to him. "Papyrus?"

"YES?"

"C-U-O-F-F-K-F!" She spelt out triumphantly. Papyrus instantly reacted with panicked horror, rushing to find a pen and paper, and once he did, desperately scribbling down her letters in order to unscramble them at once.

Frisk blushed the moment she figured it out mentally, staring at Alphys with a mix of shock and admiration. Even if he managed to unscramble it without her help, Alphys still won.

"That should keep him busy," Alphys said with a grin. She looked back at Frisk. "Backyard?" When Frisk nodded, the two headed to the back of New New Home (yes, Asgore had named their house.), the dusk light like a grey cloud of foreboding for her.

Once they were outside and settled on the grass, Alphys turned to her and said, "Everything okay?"

Frisk took a breath, then blurted it out. "Alphys, is there a way to kill Flowey without killing Asriel?"

Alphys stared at her, starting to tremble and sweat at the same time. Her face paled and her hands instantly clenched together before her. "I-I-I'm sorry..." she manged. "W-what?"

Flowey's laugh was hysterical, high pitched and full of mockery. Sans stayed still, his empty eyes giving out nothing. He kept silent, waiting for a better answer. Eventually, he did get one.

"Is that what you truly think?! You fool! You IDIOT!"

Sans tilted his head slowly to one side. "That is neither yes or no," he observed.

"Don't you think that if I were, I would be this?" Flowey laughed again. "Would it make you feel better, believing that, rather than admitting how weak you've gotten?"

Sans shrugged. "No one likes to admit weakness, but that is not the main reason."

"Well, tough shit, judge," Flowey spat. "You know better. I pity your friends, if that's how stupid you've become with peace."

"And you honestly believe that Frisk has had peace these eight years?" Sans answered.

"Do you really think I care?"

"Yes," Sans replied slowly, his voice a blood-chilling rumble, now. "I do, very much so. And I would like you to stop, now."

"How...?" Alphys wondered, her eyes searching Frisk's. "H-how d-did you...?"

"You know I read your reports, Alphys, in the True Lab," Frisk answered, trying to be patient, but sounding terse, instead. She had waited all day to ask this, and now she was being deflected. She hated how Alphys's face looked, a mix of shame and regret, of painful panic. "Including the ones about Flowey, the 'vessel' you created for my father, as a surprise for him."

Alphys stared at her. She was outright shaking, now. "I-I... I..." she stammered.

This frustrated Frisk, though she didn't know why. "You wrote about how you wanted to surprise him with the first flower grown in the garden from the outside world, where Asriel and Chara died. I need to know: is Flowey Chara, and if not, can we find a way to bring Asriel back somehow?"

Something clicked in Alphys's eyes. "The flash of white..." she muttered. "Something did happen. I-I had thought... I h-had been afraid-,"

"Alphys, answer me, dammit!" Frisk snapped, shocking Alphys into shrinking away from her. "Is it possible? Is he Chara?"

"I-I don't know!" Alphys admitted. "I-I don't know all of what you're s-saying! Ch-Chara... you mean Asgore's d-daughter?"

Frisk sighed, then shut her eyes. Without pause, she told Alphys everything that had happened in that flash of light - and time.

"You idiot," snarled Flowey. "I don't care about anyone but myself, and you know it, judge. Kill or be killed. You know that!"

"You like to lie, do you not? You do it very often, especially to Frisk. I am surprised you have managed to keep it going for so long."

"Still think I'm Asriel, do you?"

Sans nodded slowly. "Yes. Enough with the lies. We both know the truth. Stop pretending and tell me why you are still doing..." He raised his hand, and something flashed in his left eye socket. "...this." He waved his hand over Flowey from top to bottom.

"Sorry, bastard, but this is who I am," Flowey laughed in reply.

"No. It is not. And never has been. Stop lying."

Alphys was holding one of Frisk's hands between her own now, as Frisk finished her story up to the previous night. Alphys was still shaking, but concern for Frisk showed more than anything else.

"Oh, Frisk, I-I'm s-so s-sorry," she murmured now, her voice choked and her eyes hidden behind fogged lenses. "I-it's all my fault..."

Frisk shook her head, no longer angry. Instead, she felt sad, tired of being sad. "No. There were a lot of mistakes with good intentions. I know you meant well. But... are you able to answer, now?"

Alphys thought for a while, and Frisk waited, watching the lenses of Alphys's glasses clear and her eyes dart from side to side with each thought. Then they widened. "Yes! I can!" She sounded surprised by this.

"You can? Which one?"

"Both!" Alphys said at once, her voice speeding up as she went on. "There's no way Flowey is Chara. Chara was human and had no magic, no soul left, neither of them, once Asriel died. No, Chara is dead, or a ghost somewhere, if anything..." Her eyes fell on Frisk's shocked expression, and she blushed. "I-I-I'm sorry. Th-that was... rather c-cold of me."

Frisk shook her head. She was relieved more than anything else. "It's not that, but please, go on."

Alphys did so. "Asriel, though... th-that's another story completely. His dust spread on the garden, giving life to the flowers he brought back with his dead sister. At least, that's what my predecessor thought. They spread his ashes - your parents, sorry - on his toys, his favourite things, and so on. But that dust in he garden spread on those flowers while he and the flowers both still had his and Chara's last bits of soul... a different kind of - well, I suppose calling it 'danger' is the only word to use after what he has done - happened that night. The flowers soaked up the life force, began to grow. When I thought about a vessel for DT, I wanted to... please Asgore, really, and chose the first flower that bloomed in the garden. When I injected it..."

"Flowey," Frisk said, her eyes now as wide as Alphys's.

"Y-yes. He had no soul, but he knew who he was, I-I think... No... wait, what if...?" Her eyes looked troubled. "Wait... it was almost like..." She suddenly went rigid, them trembled like a dying leaf on a branch. "Oh, no. Oh, no, no, no, no! Almost like-!"

"Like what, Alphys? Tell me!"

Flowey glared hatred at Sans, who stared back. "Idiot bastard," he snarled again, but his voice faltered slightly.

"Who is the bigger bastard, the bigger idiot?" Sans wondered calmly. "The liar, or the judge? The prince, or the jester?"

"You have no idea what you're talking about."

"More lying, Prince Liar. Please, do be honest."

Flowey sneered at him. "The soulless need no honesty."

Sans grinned at Flowey, now, another flash sparking in his left socket in the darkening night. "Ah, but we both know you're not soulless, Prince Asriel. And you never were."

Alphys turned to Frisk, dragging herself then Frisk to their feet. "I-I'm such a-a... Frisk! W-we ne-need to..." She pulled on Frisk's arm, looking panicked. "W-we have to-,"

"Slow down, Alphys," Frisk broke in gently, stopping her pulling with her other hand, though her heart was racing. "Slow down, and go a thought at a time."

"W-we need to find h-him, I-I can't believe it..." She was pale, now, her hands shaking so hard they also shook Frisk's, but her eyes were blazing. "I-I'm such a loser, F-Frisk!" Her eyes searched Frisk's. "Y-yes, th-there's a way, b-but we need to f-find him and go to the True Lab. I-I didn't think... I-I never imagined... If I had, this wouldn't of h-happened...!"

"Again, slow down, Alphys. What didn't you know?"

Alphys's eyes suddenly filled with tears. "He... h-he has a soul, F-Frisk. H-he always had one. I-I did a t-terrible th-thing! Wh-why did I... Why d-didn't I...?"

Frisk went cold. "He... has a soul?!"

"Y-yes. Ever since I-I injected him w-with... determination..."

"A soul? Please," Flowey snorted, laughing again. "You know all the things I've done, judge, don't you? You know anyone with a soul would never do those things!"

Sans shook his head. "We both know that anyone with a soul can also be cruel. But again, I say, you are not soulless, and never have been. No matter what you did, Frisk used her power to erase it all." He paused. "You waited a long time for someone like her to overthrow your power. It must have been painful for you."

Flowey was silent, his smile ugly, now. "Shut up," he said carefully, his anger so thorough he trembled.

Sans only smiled. "Especially since she's practically Chara. Isn't she? That hurts, too, doesn't it? Seeing a version of Chara that is actually good?"

"Shut up!" Flowey screamed, suddenly surrounded by three rows of his magic bullets.

"And why do you want me to do that?" Sans wondered idly. "Because I am wrong?" His voice practically shook the ground beneath him, it was so deep. As the light darkened, the fire in his eye slowly lit up. "Or because I'm perfectly right?"

"I will kill you, judge," Flowey warned, his entire face becoming hideous in his rage. "I will make it slow, and painful, and in a way that will make you wish Chara had killed you."

"If I remember correctly, Chara killed you." Sans answered calmly.

"Well, she's dead now, isn't she? So who cares about that, or her?"

"Or Frisk?"

"Or Frisk!" Flowey agreed, laughing his high-pitched laugh at him. "Or you! Or anyone! I could kill you all and you would never see it coming! Hell, we both know I have already!" The bullets slowly began to spin around him as he spoke. "Why not start with you, judge?"

"Because you know you cannot kill me. Not and be able to keep her. Just like I will not kill you to put you out of your misery. For her. So stop lying. It is tiresome."

"I WILL kill you!" Flowey snarled. "Go away, or die!"

Sans didn't move. He simply put his hands in his pockets, his eye's flame getting brighter the faster those bullets spun.

"I mean it! Leave or die!"

Sans suddenly smiled. It was a sad smile. "You sound so like your mother when you say that."

"Please move, please move, please move!" Frisk shouted, her voice breaking. "I don't have anything for you, but we need to get by!"

A pause. Then, "We?"

"Yes. I-I'm here," Alphys spoke up, trying to peer over the spikes.

They instantly vanished. "Wow. Another celebrity, here in my puzzle!" the rock gushed. "What a week this is!"

Frisk stopped. "What did you say?!" she demanded. "Who was here?! Who else was here?"

Alphys was already running. She knew the way already, having monitored several of the puzzles within.

"Why, that kind skeleton gentleman, the one with the pinpoint eyes."

Frisk was already running after Alphys, the moment he said "skeleton".

"I don't have a mother," Flowey snarled.

"Oh? Then why do you remain in her former domain?"

"Shut up! Or I'll kill you right where you stand!" Flowey laughed, hysterical again, but for real. "Sound familiar, judge?! Gonna have a bad time, judge?!"

Sans stared at him in silence.

"What, no snappy comeback, no witty pun?" Flowey wondered, his smile twitching. "No ridiculous deflection, no attempt to pretend things are fine?!"

"Are they?" Sans wondered, his eye now a brilliant flame of blue and orange, orange and blue.

"They won't be if you don't leave!" Flowey answered. With a sneer, he threw several of his bullets towards Sans, but he didn't move, and they landed harmlessly around him - just as they were meant to.

"That is the best you can do?" Sans wondered, slowly flexing his left hand.

"They were warnings, bastard!" Flowey answered, though something had changed in his voice, now, something deep in the depths of it. "If you so much as scratch your ass with that hand, I will kill you!"

Sans smiled wider suddenly. But still he said nothing. Flowey suddenly reared up, his face an ugly mess of hatred and... something else. Sans slowly raised his left hand in reply - only not to scratch.

And that was when a stick landed between them, startling Flowey but only making Sans blink. "Stop, Sans!" Frisk shouted, running up to his side. "Stop! You promised!"

"I did," he agreed.

"Then lower your hand, Sans!" Frisk shouted.

He didn't even look at her. Instead, he raised it, kept his gaze on Flowey, and pointed at Frisk. With a chill, she felt that familiar tug within her heart, and instinct flooded through her, urging her to respond.

"S-Sans, wait! D-don't-!" Alphys tried to break in, but she was cut off.

"No!" Flowey suddenly shouted, in a strange, unfamiliar voice. "No! Stop! Stop! You win!"

But it was too late.