Chapter Text
Asgore’s House, New Home - April 27, 211X
Asgore Dreemurr had grown to dislike mornings.
Well, admittedly, it wasn’t the mornings themselves that were the problem. A visit to the barrier at this hour, in fact, might reveal a treasured ray of the sunrise, should the barrier’s magic ebb in just the right way.
And while there were plenty of monsters who might point to grogginess to explain their preference for later hours, Asgore tended to wake fresh for the day.
But... well.
Waking to a silence that was broken only by the distant humming of the CORE, without even the bustle of the morning crowds in the streets of New Home in full enough force to drift up to his house, had become very lonely, after so long.
It was a pleasant surprise, then, to hear a knock at the door as he was getting dressed for the day.
“Just a moment!” Asgore called out, hurrying to finish buttoning his shirt. A quick glance in the mirror confirmed his hair and beard just smooth enough to be presentable for the hour.
Asgore hurried to the foyer and opened the door. Outside, he found a young red bird monster in a postal service uniform struggling to balance an unwieldy, moderately large box.
“G-Good morning, Y-Your Highness!” they squawked. “S-Sorry, this is heavy, and-!”
Asgore took the box from the mailbird with a smile that he would swear was only friendly and not also amused.
“It’s quite alright. I must say, I’m not used to getting packages like this,” Asgore said. He lightly inspected the box, noting the warnings to keep it balanced and the lack of a return address. Strange, but...
The mailbird smiled nervously. “Y-Yeah, I um... T-To be honest, none of us were sure where that came from, but none of our package scanners flagged anything and Cana—uh, she’s one of my coworkers, she’s a dog monster with a really good nose—couldn’t smell anything weird, just... floral, I think she said,” they admitted. Their tail feathers twitched. “But then, well... I drew the short straw as far as who got to bring it to you.”
Asgore shook his head warmly. “It’s alright. I’m sure that at worst, this is just a prank,” he promised, “and if it smelled floral, I have my doubts that it’s even that.” He stepped inside and sat the box on the bookshelf next to the stairs into the basement, then returned to the mailbird. “Would you like a cup of tea before you head back?” he asked.
The mailbird’s eyes lit up. “Uh-yes! ...Please. Sir,” they coughed.
Asgore beamed. “Coming right up, then. Feel free to sit at the table in the living room.”
The tea was quickly made, and Asgore delivered it—along with a few cups and spoons and a jar of sugar—to the table. The mailbird mixed a few spoonfuls of sugar into their cup and drank about as fast as they could have without burning themselves.
“Thank you for the tea, but I’ve probably got another delivery soon.”
“Of course. Don’t let me keep you,” Asgore replied with a wave.
After the mailbird left, Asgore contemplated the package, mulling over what it could be or who it could be from. Flowers would certainly align with his interests, but why no return address, then? An unmarked package with no visible indication of its contents was certainly something Dr. Gaster might have done before his... accident, but in lieu of conveniently eccentric skeletons to blame, Asgore decided that the best way to get an answer to the second question was to answer the first.
That didn’t mean he wasn’t going to be smart about it, though, just in case the mailbird’s coworker had been wrong. He stepped a few paces away and summoned his trident, then used it to carefully pry the box open. He craned his neck to better see the contents.
What greeted him were six glass cases, all containing vibrant, gorgeous flowers in a variety of hues—though one of them specifically had two flowers inside, one yellow and one blue, entwined as if embracing. A small pink statuette that looked a bit like a bipedal cat monster posing with a large staff sat next to a case containing an orange flower.
Asgore set the lid down and dismissed his trident. He couldn’t stop smiling. “Golly, and to think I was worried about what this might be,” he mused. “This little statue... hm, did Dr. Alphys send these?”
Perhaps she’d picked up more from Dr. Gaster than just his specialization in engineering? It was an amusing thought, and one Asgore debated as he carried the flowers to the throne room.
He scanned the garden until his eyes rested on one patch of empty ground that was currently in direct sunlight. Perfect.
He quickly ran back up to his living room to grab some gardening tools, then set to work giving his new friends a home.
Delicate motions removed the cases one by one and placed the flowers inside into the soil below. First aqua, then purple, then green, then orange, then yellow, then blue, until only the golden flower remained. Asgore began to pull off the case, then gasped as the flower fell over limply. A closer look revealed that the flower’s stem had been cut, then hastily taped back together.
“I see why you might have been sent to me,” Asgore murmured worriedly, setting the case back down. He thought over his options. He’d never attempted using healing magic on a flower before, and between the two of them Toriel had always been better at it, but...
He owed it to the flowers, and to whoever had sent them, to at least try.
Asgore put his whole hand over the glass, then focused his magic. Soft green light flooded the glass down to the soil, then trickled through the roots into the cut. He breathed a sigh of relief as the cut began to mend, and a shade of vibrancy filled the flower’s petals.
Asgore gingerly placed the flower in the soil—surrounded by the others, which felt right for a reason he couldn’t consciously explain—and considered the statuette for a moment before placing it in the window nearest to the flowers.
A few light sprays of water from a bottle handled the last of the care he could give the flowers for the time being.
“I’ll be back later, alright?” Asgore promised, gathering his tools as he stood up.
As much as he wanted to spend the whole day with his new arrivals, he had duties to attend to—and perhaps if he was lucky, he might find out had sent these flowers in the first place.