Frisk was in the warm place in his dreams where he was before. More importantly HE was there surrounding him with his warmth and love.
"You know who I am," he said. "Don't you, Frisk?"
Frisk nodded and said, "I don't understand why you're showing mercy to me or why you want to save me. Do you know what I've done?"
"Of course. I see all no matter how many times you've reset the timeline."
"You are the highest Law. You know what I deserve. So, why won't you go ahead and banish me to hell already?!"
"I offer the same forgiveness to all no matter what a person has done. It's not what a person deserves. It's a gift only I can give."
The light came back again, and he offered his hand to Frisk.
"My mercy is yours if only you'll take it. Will you take it?" he asked.
Frisk once again hesitated, and the light filled his vision.
Frisk opened his eyes and saw light coming through the window. It was morning. He sat up and looked over the side of the bed, but Papyrus was nowhere to be found.
Frisk turned off the heating pad that was around his torso, pulled it off, jumped out of bed, and went into the bathroom. After doing his business and washing his hands and his face, he turned and saw the window he had jumped from the day before. He was alone now. It was way too tempting.
Frisk opened the window letting in the cold morning air and looked out. The snow was still on the ground, so the river was still good and cold. If no one was around, he could do it. He could put himself out of their misery with no one to notice or to care.
Nevertheless, Frisk hesitated. He remembered the one who had spoken to him in the night, the voice who loved him and wanted him to accept his mercy, and he froze in place with his hands on the ice-covered window sill.
It didn't make sense. Why did he want him to live so badly? What was there to live for? Surely, all Frisk had done was cause misery. Wouldn't killing himself make up for all that and make it all better? Was his life worth that much? Frisk didn't know. Frisk didn't feel like making the effort to know. He only wanted it all to stop, or at least, that's what he thought he wanted. He wasn't sure of that either.
"Frisk?! What are you doing?"
Frisk turned around and saw Papyrus standing in the doorway.
"Don't you know how cold it is outside?" Papyrus asked as he walked in and shut and locked the window again. "You could get hypothermia again, and then, we'd never be able to nurse you back to mental health."
Frisk looked out the window in dismay before he felt his hand being grabbed by Papyrus.
"Come on, Frisk," Papyrus said pulling Frisk behind him as he walked through his bedroom. "We have to go to town. You need a toothbrush and a certain older brother who shall not be named has not yet come back from the store to give you one…Oh, yeah."
Papyrus paused on the landing and said, "I guess I should give you a tour. Where you've been sleeping is my room and that room over there is where my lazy-as-hell brother sleeps. In between these rooms is the laundry room/bathroom. It's both since we didn't have much room to put them anywhere else."
Papyrus lifted Frisk and held him over the railing catching him off guard immediately.
"Down there is the den where we watch TV," Papyrus said before doing a somersault in the air over the railing and landing on his feet on the floor in front of the TV.
"Over there is the kitchen and under the stairs is the bathroom," Papyrus said nonchalantly while Frisk was still shaking in place. "And that's our house. Are you still cold? Hold on. Wait here while I look for your shoes and one of Sans' coats."
Papyrus put Frisk on the ground and run upstairs to the laundry room. Frisk took the time to look around. The place was nice. He had never actually hung out there before even though Papyrus had offered before. It was cozy, and the carpet felt soft under his feet. He wandered over to the kitchen and saw two pots cooking on the stove. Unfortunately, Frisk was too short to see what was cooking inside the pots, but he could smell it and it didn't smell pleasant.
It suddenly occurred to Frisk that he was out of Papyrus' sight for the moment. If he wanted to act, it was now his chance.
Frisk turned around and walked as quickly and as quietly as he could until he reached the door. Then he turned the handle and opened the door. Frisk took a deep breath and prepared to do what he had failed to do yesterday. It was for the best.
Frisk stepped outside and felt himself being pulled backwards by the collar of his shirt.
"No, Frisk! Bad boy!" Papyrus said pulling him closer to the couch while pushing the door shut. "You can't go out there by yourself without me or Sans, especially not without a coat or shoes. You could freeze again. Besides, Sans said you must be constantly supervised until you are no longer suicidally depressed. Now, come on. Put on your stuff. We have to get back before your food gets burnt."
Frisk didn't want to fight him, so he had no choice but to do what he said. Frisk sat on the couch and pulled on his socks and shoes and Sans' black coat.
"Alright, Frisk! Let's go!" Papyrus said suddenly lifting Frisk, sitting him on his shoulders, and walking to the door. "Don't bump your head on the doorframe."
"I can walk," Frisk said immediately feeling slightly taken aback from hearing his own voice for the first time that day. It sounded sad and pitiful.
"I know you can, human," Papyrus said stepping outside and slamming the door shut behind him. "But you're short and will walk too slow, and we're in a hurry. Let's go!"
Papyrus started sprinting through the snow as fast as he could. It was all Frisk could do to keep himself from falling backwards. He leaned forward and wrapped his arms around Papyrus' head while Papyrus held onto his legs.
The cold wind rushed through Frisk's hair and his clothes and made him feel both cold and nauseous at the same time. Everything on either side of him looked like a blur.
"Papyrus," Frisk said barely audible above the sound of the rushing air. "Can we slow down?"
"No can do, Frisk," Papyrus said. "We're almost there. Weee!"
Frisk's stomach dropped while Papyrus jumped over several logs that were lying in the middle of the road doing a perfect vertical split in the air and landing on his feet on the other side. He kept running without skipping a beat.
"God, this skeleton's gonna kill me," Frisk whispered to himself.
Papyrus suddenly stopped in front of what looked like a grocery store.
"Here, we are, human," Papyrus said finally putting Frisk down on his feet. "This is Snowdin's best and only grocery store! Nyeh heh heh! Come on!"
Papyrus grabbed Frisk's hand and pulled him into the store behind him. Frisk staggered along as best he could still feeling dizzy from Papyrus' run.
Meanwhile, Sans walked in to the kitchen of Toriel's home. Toriel was sitting at the table sipping tea.
"Thanks for letting me crash in the guest room," Sans said. "I don't know what came over me last night. I was so tired."
"Are you heading back now?" Toriel asked.
"Well, I would but I kinda forgot most of what we talked about since I was so tired," Sans said sitting in the chair across from her. "Would you mind running it by me again? Especially the part about the flower."
Toriel chuckled and smiled to herself, but her demeanor immediately changed as she remembered.
"It's as I told you last night," she said. "I found the child the other day on my daily search for humans. He was being tormented by that flower. I have never seen any monster like that flower anywhere in the Underground, and I hope I never see him again. He was so cruel. I couldn't take it…"
"Wait, what did he look like?" Sans asked. "What all did he do?"
"The flower looked like one of the yellow flowers that grow down here except he had a face. When I found Frisk, the flower was laughing at him. I'm sure I didn't catch everything, but he kept mocking Frisk for how he had failed again and again. He told him the more he tried to be a good person down here the more he failed and since he messed up every time…"
Toriel shed a few tears before saying, "he should just make everything better by ending his life. After that, he tried to kill Frisk, but I stepped in and drove him away. When I took Frisk with me, I led him as far as I could before I had to leave to do some shopping, but I could tell by looking at him something was off. He looked at me like I was a ghost, like he knew me, like he was terrified…"
"That's how Frisk looked at me, too," Sans said. "But he still met up with you at your house?"
"Yes, he did. He took a nap while I baked him some pie and we talked a little bit afterwards, but I couldn't get him to tell me what was bothering him. Later when he ran into the basement to escape, I tried fighting him, but he broke down. He wouldn't stop crying and saying over and over that 'he was right' and that 'he had to end everything' or something horrible would happen. That's when he started getting delusional. Frisk kept rambling on and on about horrible things he had supposedly done to people he shouldn't have known about. I took him back to his room and stayed with him until he fell asleep, but when I woke up the next morning, he was gone. All that he left was a note. He said he thanked me because I was being kinder to him than he deserved, that he would be good, and that he would not be facing Asgore, because he would be dead long before that happened…"
Toriel started crying.
Sans sat there thinking to himself and said, "You did everything you could for him, Toriel. Don't beat yourself up over it."
"It doesn't make any sense," Toriel said. "Why would such a young child hate himself and think he deserves to die? No one in the Ruins has been murdered…"
"No one in Snowdin has been either."
"It's that awful flower. I just know it. He's been tormenting Frisk and driving him crazy. Frisk must have been here alone with him longer than I know. Poor child."
"He's been talking to Papyrus, too."
"Make sure he stays away from him. That flower is more of a monster than either of us are."
"Definitely," Sans said getting up from his chair. "Thanks for everything, Toriel. I better get back to Frisk before Papyrus drives him to the nuthouse. Don't worry. I'll make sure he gets better and keep you updated on his progress."
Toriel hesitated for a second before she decided to say something.
"Sans, I know you know something else," Toriel said. "You can tell me."
Sans stopped in his tracks and looked back at her.
"That flower talked to him like he knew him and like Frisk had been here before," Toriel said. "And when I was with Frisk, I felt like I was repeating myself, especially when we were fighting. He also mentioned enemies he shouldn't even know about. I know there are wizards on the surface. I think Frisk is one of them and he can turn back time, but for some reason only the flower can remember what happened before. I know you do research, Sans. I used to be married to the king after all. Please tell me. How close am I?"
"That's classified…" Sans started to say.
Toriel held Sans' soul and surrounded it with her fire magic, so he couldn't move.
"We are separated, but I am still the queen," Toriel said more forcefully. "You will tell me what I want to know."
"Easy, Toriel!" Sans said as calmly as he could. "You're right. I'll tell you whatever you want."