Before them all, the barrier shattered into a million tiny pieces, cracking under the strain of so much determination. It was a worthy sacrifice, Flowey had certainly used up all of his SOUL’s power in doing so - as well as the original six that had fallen into this hell hole - and was hanging weakly in Frisk’s arms. The human was quick to get him back into the soil where he belonged, tucking him back into his flowerpot once more, and wishing him a speedy recovery.<br/><br/>Casting a lazy glance over the horizon, King Asgore Dreemurr breathed a sigh of relief, of victory, and allowed himself those first few steps into a new life. He felt her presence then, his wife, the ex-Queen, and - although neither spoke a word, but rather he gazed at her and she at him - reassured her that this was a new beginning for them both. It was not the same, would never be so again, between them, but it was new…<br/><br/>The Captain of the Royal Guard sat back on a rock near the mouth of the cave, and felt the sun on his bones for the first time in his entire life. It had all been worth it, hadn’t it? The pain and suffering had only led him to understand that the feeling he felt now was ten times more satisfying than it would have been if he had stayed blissfully ignorant to life. Frisk and Aster had certainly helped him to see beyond the blood red haze that had consumed his entire life. As he stretched out one clawed hand, he mused on whether he should try picking up a second magic type in this new land? Perhaps...orange maybe? It certainly seemed like something he could manage.<br/><br/>Behind him, Sans closed his eyes, feeling the warmth of a brilliant sunrise spread through his very core. He didn’t have to be near Papyrus to know that they both shared the same thoughts. For so long he’d dreamed of this: a place where he didn’t have to fight anymore. No more suffering, no more blood, and no more guilt.<br/><br/>Now it was here; his freedom.<br/><br/><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: andale mono;"><strong>“We have much to do.”</strong></span></span>Finally, as though breaking them out of a delightful reverie, Asgore’s booming voice sounded in the mouth of the cave. The sun made his fur seem to glisten for a moment - not so much black, but rather a deep golden brown that could have not ever been seen in the darkness below - and he smiled at his subjects. A perfect leader.<span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: andale mono;">“Let us be free.”</span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: andale mono;"><strong>“About time.” </strong></span></span>Papyrus tried to his his glee behind his usual cynical remarks, but was reminded that his happiness probably lay in the capable arms of a certain robot who draped himself over his shoulders and gave his skull a playful swat to remind him not to be such a grouchy bones.<br/><br/>All stepped forwards and into the light…<br/><br/>...except one.<br/><br/>W D Aster would have taken her first steps into a world she had never seen before, but something seemed to stop her. Just as she was about to cross that threshold, about to feel the warmth of the sun she’d dreamed about and talked about with her father so many times as a child, a long clawed bony hand reached out of what felt like nothingness and gripped her shoulder hard.<br/><br/>At the feel of that sudden harshness, she gasped in surprise:<span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">“Ungh?</span></span>”<br/><br/>A voice that seemed to drip into her senses, and flood every fibre of her being, whispered to her,<span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><del><strong>“No….tt….SO…..fAs...sst…..we...ha….ve…...some...unf….INis…..sssHHed….busINEsssss….”</strong></del></span><br/><br/>She went rigid. That voice...the one that had haunted her dreams for so long now...it was him.<span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">“No...no...no no no...NO! You...you’re not --”</span></span><br/><br/>Before she could utter one more syllable, another hand gripped her skull hard, pulling her head back harshly. Pain flooded her being for a moment before she realised that there were more hands appearing, one clamping over her mouth, another pushing against her chest, two more gripping her wrists...her legs…<br/><br/>They started to pull, a hole opening up in time and space behind her - she knew that feeling well. Naturally, she took advantage of the space of void in the palm of his hand, and reached through it to scream:<span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">“HELP!”</span></span><br/><br/>That got everyone’s attention.<br/><br/>It was Sans who reacted first, but Papyrus who was moving before he could do so. Memories flooded back to the taller skeleton, ones of that sadistic voice and those hands and the yawning open mouth of a void that seemed to suck in every ounce of happiness and -<br/><br/>“ASTER!”<br/><br/>As the hands started to pull her into the shifting mass of black swirling energy behind her, she heard a voice screaming her name, and felt tiny hands clutch her own. Although she couldn’t see anything due to the claws pulling her skull back painfully, she knew who it was, even before she heard Flowey’s shrill cry of: “FRISK! NO!”<br/><br/>And then darkness…<br/><br/>Frisk was no longer there. Everything was black. Everything was black and there seemed to be a noise filling Aster’s head - a noise like static or a computer loading or...something. So this was the void. Time seemed to move quickly, and yet sluggish, and everything seemed to be encased in a thick wall of blackness. Only she herself remained visible.<br/><br/>Was this what her father had felt?<br/><br/>Pulling on all sides, threatening to rip her apart, destroy her SOUL? Static and noise filling her head and attempting to crack her skull from the inside out? Was this what had happened all those years ago when her Father had first tested the void and had returned home that late evening with a split running down his skull from his eye? The one he’d told her not to worry about, but she knew it had shaken him because he kept touching his war wound on his useless eye as though checking it to make sure it hadn’t gotten bigger...or worse.<br/><br/>It reminded her of when she had first been tortured by Sans and Papyrus.<br/><br/>That feeling of sheer helplessness that had her crying out into the nothingness,<span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">“Father!! Father!!!”</span></span><br/><br/>Hands slid over her shoulders, pulling her into a solid frame that seemed to appear - materialise - from within the void itself, and seemed to hold her gently. Almost tenderly. For a moment, she swore she could hear a voice murmuring in her head with such gentle tones,<span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><strong>“Shhh...Daddy’s here…”</strong></span><br/><br/>...then the grip hardened and she recognised that voice in an instant.<br/><br/>Spinning round, practically tearing her sweater from that bony grip, she saw him stood there. Not the Gaster of her world, but rather the one who had seeped into her very being all the time she had been here, the one whom Papyrus did not dare to think or speak about. He was laughing, hands appearing all around her, all dotted with various colours swirling in the centre of their palms, voice cracked and torn from sharp teeth and a face that seemed to shift and melt with the void’s energy.<br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><del><strong>“You have...no idea….how long I have...waited to do this!”</strong></del></span>He seemed to be pulling himself together, voice no longer distorted, but clear as a bell,<del><strong><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">“All that waiting and whining and making promises that I did not intend to keep! Having to service that damn fool Asgore so he could feel just a little bit better about the fact that he got us trapped down here in the first place!! Because he was so weak!!”</span></strong></del><br/><br/>A sigh, a single eye gazing at Aster with such utter glee,<span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><strong><del> “And now...now I have my chance…”</del></strong></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">“No!” </span></span>Aster whimpered, trying to move, trying to back away from him through the void’s energy,<span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">“NO! There has to be another way! You don’t have to do this! Stop!”</span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><del><strong>“Oh?” </strong></del></span>Amusement danced in his voice, the same sick amusement that Papyrus had held in his tones when he had been torturing her,<span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><del><strong>“But you see...it’s not a case of there being another way or not...it’s a case of me simply wanting to, my dear. Now hold still and let ‘daddy’ tend to you…”<br/></strong></del></span><br/>The female skeleton’s voice seemed to be torn from her throat,<span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">“NO!”</span></span><br/><br/>One hand came up to defend herself, but she could already feel that pulse of magic overtaking her body, the void - and him - pouring into every crack and space in her bones. A whimper escaped her,<span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">“Nnn!”</span></span><br/><br/>Then...silence…<br/><br/>She was not gone, no, not by a long shot, but there was certainly something stopping the maniac from finishing what he had started. Another voice sounded in the void then. One that Aster hoped and prayed was real, one that seemed to soothe her and make her think of a time before now, before any of this pain started. Tears brimmed in her eye-sockets as she heard it.<br/><br/><del><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: georgia;"><strong>“I would suggest letting her go.”</strong></span></span></del><br/><br/>Suddenly she was falling again, falling through the void, away from that feeling of dread and fear. She cast a glance upwards and above her, to see someone stood there, someone who reminded her of the man she once knew, but there was something wrong. Everything seemed to drip and melt around him, the hand that had freed her, had pulled her away, was already starting to drip and lose its shape. That smile though...was the same.<br/><br/>She heard him clearly, in her head, around her,<del><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: georgia;"><strong>“I will not allow him to harm a single bone in your body, my wonderful daughter.”</strong></span></span></del><br/><br/><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">“F-Father!” </span></span>Tears were flowing freely now, Aster falling away further from him, but knowing that she had to or else she’d end up torn apart or lost forever like him. Her arms were outstretched, fingers trying to grab and claw through the void to just...touch him!<span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;">“Father…”</span></span><br/><br/>And then she realised, as the ground opened up beneath her, a new world blanketed in light before her, that she was not alone.<br/><br/>She could hear her father let out a startled cry, the entire void shuddering for a second as though reacting to his pain, and then there was that voice in her head again. Clawing and desperate to find any purchase on her, her father’s blood on his razor sharp fingers, a manic and needy expression on his face: the other Gaster.<br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;"><del><strong>“I WILL NOT FAIL NOW! HE CAN’T STOP ME FOREVER! I WILL HAVE MY --”</strong></del></span>Cut off suddenly, his voice seemed to vanish, but remained echoing in her mind and SOUL for what seemed like forever.<br/><br/>Before she could think or respond, there was a flash, followed by a sinking and falling feeling, and then...flowers. Beautiful rows of flowers that seemed to bloom in the beam of sunlight that fell from the mouth of the wide expanse of the mountain above her.<br/><br/>Next to her was not a hideous void creature as she had imagined, but rather an all too familiar human that had held her moments before she had vanished. She knew it was her human - her Frisk - because of the pink glittery plasters that Mettaton had placed all over their face and hands when they’d been injured in Hotlands what seemed like forever ago.<br/><br/><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">“Frisk?”</span></span>The female skeleton murmured gently,<span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">“Are you alright?”</span></span><br/><br/>A gentle shake and a warm smile. Aster sighed,<span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">“Wake up.”</span></span>