Sunlight. Warm sunlight, cast down upon his body. It felt so nice, here in the garden. His father's garden, full of golden buttercups that rustled gently in a light breeze around him. The holes in the throne room's ceiling were what allowed this amazing sunlight in, and Asriel felt his eyes slowly open.
His head felt light. Actually, everything felt light. Had it all been a bad dream? Had Chara...
No... it felt too real. He looked to his left. More flowers. To his right yielded the same results. He tried to rise to his feet, but only moved inches.
Confused, he looked about. He was only slightly taller than the flowers around him. What had happened? Had he shrunk somehow?
Horror struck him as he realized a horrible truth. He couldn't feel his arms. His legs, even. Just his body, which felt...
A look down confirmed the growing fear. A green stem stuck out of the bottom of his head.
He was... a flower.
He couldn't take it. He felt a surge of emotion. Fear, mostly, but also regret, anguish, and a desire for comfort. "MOMMY!!!" he cried, his shrill voice echoing through the empty throne room... and there was no response. "DADDY!" he tried again, his voice breaking as he felt tears well in his eyes. "HELP ME! PLEASE!" his cries of desperation continued, his stem beginning to shake fearfully as he wanted to curl up where he was. He just wanted his parents more than anything right now.
But nobody came.
His cries went on for what felt like hours, and he was hoarse when he went silent, hanging his head among the flowers around, tears still dripping from his eyes. He felt so scared. Scared and alone. He'd never felt so alone before.
Then a heavy thud echoed from somewhere else in the castle. He perked up, turning his head to look at the entrance. "HELP!" he cried frantically. Silence... before heavy footsteps sounded. Somebody was headed his way. "HELP ME!" the flower cried again, and the pace hurried before his father rounded the corner, entering the throne room with a look of concern etched across his weathered face.
"DAD!" Asriel cried with relief. Asgore frowned, looking about for a moment- before his eyes landed on the flower. He was more confused than anything for a moment as he stared at his son, before Asriel quickly added; "Dad, it's me! It's Asriel!" his shrill voice didn't sound like he used to- but it didn't seem to matter to his father.
Asgore was on the ground, disregarding any of the flowers he was flattening to gently cradle Asriel to his face, the king wasting no time in weeping. "By Orion..." Asgore breathed, his voice shaking. "My son... my son... you're back..." he continued to cry, and Asriel finally got the comfort he wanted, held protectively by his father, but... something was wrong.
He didn't feel that relief again. It had vanished as quickly as it came. In fact, all of the emotions he'd just experienced... it was all... disappearing...
It left him silent and confused as he allowed the king to weep.
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Hours passed into days. Days into weeks. Asriel remained in the garden with his father, who spent almost all of his time with his resurrected son now. They drank tea (or at least Asriel tried, but he didn't enjoy it anymore, which surprised both him and his father), they read stories, they shared tales... well, it was mostly Asgore doing all of that as he tried desperately to comfort his son, who didn't seem to respond to anything.
Asriel felt nothing about all of this. He knew how he should feel, but he just... didn't feel. At all. He felt impossibly empty inside, and he wanted to fill that emptiness with something. Anything. Even with the King, he felt alone.
