shel dork

i’ve been discussing this a lot with one of my mutuals who liked the chapter more than i did so far, so i’ll quote with their permission; “keeping asgore distracted and happy seems to be a strategy to make sure the flowers aren't hurt by him, physically or emotionally. asgore is outright being threatening and terrifying when he fixates on the dark world and dark fountain. the fact that flowery keeps fawning (…) it reads that flowery is trying to keep him from hurting anyone, and he's redirecting asgore’s behavior by trying to get him to engage with the other flowers who want his attention and love. it's a fucking horrific situation because (…) his entire existence depends on asgore’s whims.” i really do think a lot of flowery’s behavior is a fawn response, especially because asgore treats flowery in a way that very glaringly aligns with the sort of father he is to his light-world children. flowery sees asgore as the man who raised him too, after all. asgore’s children seem already primed to carry burdens they shouldn’t by him, and oftentimes this corroborates asgore’s general lack of appropriate boundaries. asgore gets rough with kris and susie when throwing them out of the dark world, and in earlier chapters, repeatedly uses kris as an “in” to force his romantic gestures on toriel.

flowery’s behavior towards asgore reads far differently than asgore’s behavior towards toriel for a number of reasons, but one such reason is that in both relationships, asgore is the one “in power”; as a man, and as a caretaker-figure and lightner. flowery is literally objectified as a flower and as someone asgore raised; kris, asriel, and toriel are objectified as the members of the family he is the breadwinning patriarch of. the dynamic asgore has with the flowers emphasizes the ways he treats the people in his life like tools for his own ends and the way they learn to play multiple roles in his life as a result. their wants and needs become impositions on his own even when stripped down to appease him. and his violence is framed far more severely as someone from a grounded setting than most violence coming from someone originating in the dark worlds’ heightened fantasy setting. it’s no wonder flowery fawns when he’s around; because asgore holds the reins, his approval reigns supreme, and his self-centered worldview reflects this.

moreover, though, i feel this is the case because it’s yet another way flowery acts as a reflection of ralsei. almost all of this is stuff you’ve probably heard me say before while discussing ralsei’s relationship to the role they are meant to carry out; but it bears repeating that much of what initially comes off like ralsei tutorializing or acting overbearing is instead an attempt to ensure that we don’t hurt them or their friends. it's an extension of the idea that ralsei still seems to have clung onto; that our kindness will be enough to alter the ending of the prophecy without causing it to be defied outright. this becomes apparent in the conversation ralsei has with flowery about their prayers to the prophecy; putting their faith in themself seems sacrilegious, and coping by believing that perhaps there is a prophecy that can be merciful and kind if they are only kind enough in turn is much easier. i don’t think they believe praying will really change anything, but it’s very evident to me that it gives them a sense of comfort. if ralsei can carry the weight of this knowledge on their own, no one will get hurt. everything will be okay. the prophecy (and, depending, whoever or whatever tasked ralsei with the role of its tutorial,) will be good, and gentle, and kind. and this leads to a sense of what at first seems like pride in ralsei that mirrors flowery’s own; a coping mechanism to reason out the cruelty. i can handle the prophecy (/asgore,) i am the only one who understands the prophecy (/asgore,) you don’t understand the prophecy (/asgore,) like i do, so don’t insult it (/him). (i won’t tangent about the weird route here, but i do think noelle is similarly trying to cope with what’s been done to her there similarly.) i think this is a part of why it upsets ralsei so much to see flowery encouraging them to break the prophecy’s rules. ralsei’s come to fear that doing so without proper precaution is grounds for risking punishment.

what initially may read to some as scheming or two-facedness is, in actuality, an intricate plan to mitigate harm, and this goes both ways. i think this is why flowery comes off like a know-it-all to the other flowers. it isn’t that he’s selfishly controlling them for no reason or because they don’t share his feelings; rather, he knows asgore threatens darkness with great violence, and his close friends are all only able to have their own dreams because of the darkness. if asgore loves the darkness, he’ll love them, too. he won’t hurt them when they’ve only just started to develop their own smiles. to me, it seems as though we are meant to interpret his motives as including a want to find a way to break the rules alongside them; a way for them to maintain their lives in the darkness in spite of their natures as flowers. (and this in and of itself is something ralsei may too want and be deeply ashamed of wanting, as it seems increasingly likely that ralsei is not meant to live past the end of the prophecy, ralsei sees the broader idea of trying to live past one’s fated end as sacrilege.) the more flowery fawns, the more i think he believes he can convince asgore he and his world are worthy of defying fate for.

but more immediately, ralsei is an object, and this colors the aforementioned just as it does for flowery. loathing one’s self for being useless and being told usefulness is the only way one can matter is part and parcel of objectification. flowery claims that becoming a human will free him from the fate of a flower, but he is unable to defy fate as long as his attempts ultimately do naught but adhere to it. he remains objectified as a sort of aspiring multitool of asgore’s; thus, in the end, the darkness he longs for cannot prevail over the sun-lit “way things ought to be.”; as long as he depends on the light, he will never cast off the fate of a flower. ralsei, on the other hand, is the darkner to end all darkners; their room is perfectly empty, their hobbies are entirely tailored to be as useful to the lightners as possible, and doylistically, their being the only darkner in the party casts them as a sort of microcosm of every darkners’ struggle. ralsei doesn’t simply idealize kris and susie because they are the heroes of the prophecy; their status as lightners is critical to the dynamic between them, and as an aspect of why ralsei defers to them rather than simply seeing them as “fellow heroes”. like flowery, a lot of what initially comes across like a comedic excess of affection towards kris (and susie, though we are not shown this as often,) is, upon closer examination, deeply concerning behavior that stems in part from how ralsei has been taught to view themself in relation to the lightners by the hierarchy. it’s not a coincidence that one of ralsei’s go-to moves when trying to help kris and susie out is letting them literally walk all over them; and it’s not a coincidence that reading the way flowery talks about asgore gives one a sense of deja-vu.

note the wording of ralsei’s prayer. have mercy on them, have mercy on susie. ralsei never asks for the prophecy to have mercy on ralsei.

this got long because i wanted to give ralsei their due alongside flowery, as i think ch5 is most interesting when flowery is read as a series of mirrors that work to realize ralsei as a character rather than as simply a part of a self-contained asgore-centric conflict. the two of them are martyr-complex royalty in every sense of the word. but to circle back to what you were saying and end on a slightly less miserable note, i do think flowery’s affinity for the other flowers is very sweet. he teaches aqua to safely use knives, he acts as a dance rival to blue and sparring partner to yellow, orange outright considers him like an older brother to her, and so on. in turn, they back him up when he needs them. asgore may find them a bother now that they’ve developed their own voices, but flowery genuinely cares for them no matter what they want to be. and i think he tries to extend this to ralsei, too, noticing something’s up and using the rival approach or sparring-partner approach to try and help out. in the end, though, he’s unable to do so because he’s just as trapped as they are. in the end, he is unable to defy his fate, and ceases to be anything more than the prophesied flower man.