Flowey wakes you suddenly with his shrill shriek, and you lurch upward.

But you quickly flop back down, a sharp cry escaping your mouth. You're in pain like you've never felt before, not even that-one-time right before you quit. It's like all your muscles are all tensed and locked, your skin stretched tight over your frame, a hurricane in your stomach, your guts tied in knots, your lungs filled with lava, and your joints all twisted the wrong direction.

You're in pain. Such pain.

You let out a strangled sob, but that only hurts more, like a knife being stabbed into your diaphragm with the breath. But you can't help it, the pain tearing through you, you start to cry.

You can hear Flowey screaming but your head is pounding and you can't focus on his words, not to mention your ears are filled with your own agonized sobs.

Flowey's voice grows in volume, but the muffled words make no sense to you.

It seems like this forever, agony in your body, Flowey screaming senselessly.

And then Toriel is there, gently scooping you up, stroking you hair, cradling you in her arms. "Shh, shh, it's okay, Frisk. Everything is going to be okay. Alphys is on her way, she'll know what's wrong. Everything is going to be okay, my child."

Like this, still, unmoving in Toriel's arms, the pain abates just a little, enough for you to stop crying, take small, slightly calmer breaths.

Toriel holds you until Alphys arrives, then she settles you gently back on your bed, but holds your hand and keeps her own hand resting on your forehead.

Alphys has brought a lot of sciencey gadgets and scanners, and in addition to these, she goes through with the usual medical examination of looking in your mouth and ears and eyes, listening to your pulse, poking around at your belly.

And, in the end, looking at one of her gadgets, she looks very concerned.

"Wh-what's w-wr-rong?" You ask, your voice hoarse and throat burning.

"I-" she says quietly, "I-... I d-don't-... I think s-should c-call Dr. G-Gaster--..."

Her words make you nervous, makes your heart beat fast, every pulse another stab of agony in your chest.

It seems like an eternity until Gaster arrives. You hear him talking with Alphys quietly outside your room, their voices just murmurs.

Then Gaster is stepping over to your bed. For a long moment, he just looks at you, his face blank. Then a small, surprisingly sympathetic and gentle smile crosses his face. "So, you're not feeling well? What's wrong?"

You whimper. "E-everything h-hu-rts--..."

"Well," He murmurs, more to himself than you, "let's see if I can't fix that."

Gaster repeats Alphys's examination of you, but there's a major difference between the two examinations. Alphys's was carried out with an air of hesitation. She didn't know what was wrong with you, and her examination, apparently, yielded no conclusive results.

Gaster's examination, though, is calm and conclusive. He seems to know exactly what he's doing, and with him there, you know you're going to be okay.

Once he's finished, he turns to go. "I'll be back in a moment. I'm going to get some... medicine." He leaves without explaining what exactly he means by that, his lab coat swishing dramatically as he strides out the door.

Toriel goes back to gently stroking your head, while Alphys offers nervous assurances that you'll be okay.

After maybe ten minutes or so, Gaster comes back into the room, and sits carefully on the edge of the bed. From the pocket of his lab coat, Gaster withdraws a small bottle. He reaches out and lifts your head, pops the cork, and holds the lip of the bottle to your mouth. "Drink this."

You do. It's cool and thick and a little bit slimy, but it soothes the burning in your throat. "Feels good... w-will this make me b-better?"

Gaster opens his mouth, then closes it. Then opens it again, rubbing at the back of his neck a little. "Ehhh... no, not really. In all honesty, it's more of a test than anything else. To see if I'm right."

You get a worried expression.

Gaster chuckles a little. "Don't worry, I'm probably right."

"I-if-- if you're n-not?"

"Nothing horribly bad. You get really drowsy, probably fall asleep, and I start a more extensive examination."

"You said it wouldn't cure them." Toriel interjects softly. "So if you're right, and it's not going to make them better... what will it do?"

"Make them pretty sick in, give or take ten minutes."

You let out a small panicked cry and lurch upwards. Toriel grabs your shoulders and forces you down. It takes you a moment, but you calm down, and the fresh wave of pain recedes.

"That does not sound very good." Toriel says to Gaster.

"Well. It is. Especially if I'm right. Which I am."

"Why is it good?"

"Well, see, here's what I think is wrong. Frisk, you've been around monsters for more than three years now, completely surrounded by Magic on all sides. Now, so long as you're not touched by an actual attack, this is, generally speaking, okay. But all Magic leaves residue in the air, and you're living in an atmosphere that's absolutely saturated with it, and it's been seeping into your body. Again, ordinary circumstances, this is mostly okay. Your body filters it out gradually. Even in the event of an immense amount of Magic saturating your body, such as say, I don't know, an overflow of Magic from a prototype CORE explosion, your body should be able to circulate it out."

"But-... it's not?"

Gaster shakes his head. "No. It's... It's like... like an allergy. Really, in small amounts, you can handle it just fine. No major side effects, the equivalent of a stuffy nose and runny eyes, a headache and maybe some nausea. But with such a major amount of Magic sitting in your body... you just can't handle it. The Magic is destroying your body. Eventually, in this environment, the Magic will seep into your bloodstream, destroy all your vital organs. But!" He quickly adds, seeing the panic on your face. "But, what I gave you is a mild Magic neutralizer. If I'm wrong, it neutralizes some of the naturally occurring Magic in your Soul, and you sleep it off. I'm right, and it neutralizes most of the oversaturation, and your body-"

You flinch, your arms wrapping around your stomach as something in your gut twists.

"Yeah." Gaster says. "That. Good thing I brought this, too." And he pulls, presumably from his inventory, a bucket, and slips it in front of you just as you sit up straight and vomit.

It takes a while. Four or five minutes, you think. But eventually, you fall back in bed. You still don't feel good. You feel tired, exhausted. But the pain in your body has dulled to a throbbing ache.

Gaster peers into the bucket with your sick in it. Then he looks away. "Yeah. Definitely Magic. So, long story short, the CORE explosion filled you up with Magic, and now it's killing you."

Toriel and Alphys look panicked, but you're suddenly not afraid.

Because pain scares you yes, but you know you can survive death. Better yet, you have a solution to this.

You reach for your SAVE file.

"M-my l-last save was right b-before the explosion-- I can just go back and--"

"Change nothing in the long run." Gaster says. "Frisk, the CORE explosion was just the tipping point. This is something genetic, and the reaction began the second you came in contact with Magic. The second you first crossed the Barrier, when you fell into the Underground. Even if you could reset that far back, it would mean never freeing the monsters. Even if you stopped the CORE explosion, more Magic residue would just gradually gather in your body, and we'd reach this point again sooner or later."

"S-so I'm going to die?" You whimper.

"... Everyone does eventually."

And then Toriel reaches out and slaps Gaster across the face. He gives her an astonished look, and she slaps him again.

"Toriel-"

She slaps him again. Then she grabs Gaster's shoulder and points at you. "You would not say that if they were your child. Now do something."

Gaster gives her a pitying look. "I can't."

"Why not?" She demands. "You know so much about this... this condition. Surely you know a cure!"

"I-" Gaster protests, "I didn't read that part of the book!"

"WHAT?!"

"We were in the middle of a war, Toriel, and I was a grief-driven Royal Scientist on a quest for vengeance against humanity! I was looking for a way to weaponize it, not- not cure people!"

Toriel starts to retort, but you interject. "If-... if it was in a book, c-can't you just go read it?"

Gaster heaves a sigh. "No. It was-... it was an original, hand-written manuscript... in the Capitol City library."

"S-so..?"

Toriel and Gaster share a glance. Then Toriel says, slowly, "Frisk, after the monster surrender in the war, the humans... burned the whole of Capitol City to the ground."

You feel something wet slip down your face as the realization sinks in.

You are going to die. Resetting can't fix it.

"There h-has to be something you can do." Alphys says.

Gaster sighs. "... I suppose there's still a bit of time. The neutralizer will make Frisk weak, but it should keep the damage from going too far. I can... I'll take samples, blood, saliva, see if I can't figure something out."

Slowly, you reach out and grab Gaster's hand. He's your only hope, now.

"Stay Determined."

§

A/N

This chapter didn't go quite how I wanted, but I think I got all the important things in. So it should be okay.

Anyway, thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoyed it! Comments and votes are my Favorite Things, and every notification I get makes my day!