If you haven't read my profile, I've been ULTRA busy lately and couldn't work on the story properly last week. I'm still going to get this story out regardless of how busy I am, but it might take longer. ANYWAY, this chapter has two optional themes: "GENOCIDE AT ITS CORE" which plays when you see (1), and "MELTDOWN V2 - Undertale Bits & Pieces" which plays when you see (2). Both songs stop playing when you see (0) You may have to put one of them on loop to satisfy the length of time they'll be playing for. Hope you enjoy!
CORE Meltdown!
Skyler stands at the foot of the long wooden walkway leading straight into the CORE. Only a couple of lights on a railing in front of him brighten up the path ahead, barely enough for him to see it from start to finish as these are the only sources of light that illuminate it. A strong blue glow comes from the entrance of the CORE about 70 feet away from where he's standing, the light faintly flickering within being casted on the wooden planks opposite of where he stands. He starts walking towards his next destination, taking slow, long steps as the dirty, dust filled soles of his black shoes push him forwards on his path of death and destruction. An expressionless face sits steadfast at the head of it all, and a tight grip from his left hand keeps his somewhat newly acquired victimized tool of death in his grasp. Below him he can hear the faint sounds of metal flexing and machinery clanking together and speaking of objects below him, there's absolutely nothing to see over the side of the wooden path he walks on, an endless abyss awaits any who lose their footing and fall off.
The closer he gets to the CORE, the stronger and more profound does the blue glow become, slowly tinting his pale, bruised, cut-up, dirt stained, dust encrusted, blood bathed skin with each step he takes. The tint turns gives his green and red striped hoodie a blue-green and purple look, though what's left of it is in a condition not even the greatest seamstress in the world could fix. Ever since he got out of Waterfall, he's neglected to realize that his fight with Undyne had torn it up quite bad. As he walks, loose threads and strings catch the nearly negligible air resistance that's created, fluttering and waving gently in the hopes that they'll eventually be freed from the beast whose claws have kept them held down for so long. The skin on his chest, arms, and parts of his stomach are visible through these tears and it's a miracle that his hoodie is still hanging on despite looking like it should've fallen to pieces a long time ago. That's nothing in comparison to the filth it picked up ever since being washed by Sans back in Snowdin, the level of dust and dirt on the soft fleece fabric would've made any sane person ditch it for something else a long time ago, though his sanity is not the driving factor behind what the boy has been doing for quite some time now, and it cares not for the horrible conditions imposed on the body of its host created by its lack of care for health or cleanliness. The only thing this parasite wants now is to see whatever's left of this world burn to the ground, and with a couple more steps, it stops the boy in front of the entrance to the CORE for a few seconds before telling him to walk inside.
(1) Now that he's finally inside the CORE, he's greeted by a couple of things, most notably an elevator that stands right in front of him with an electronic sign above it. The text on the sign is colored red and reads, "NO POWER". It appears that he's gotten into a similar situation to what he encountered in the True Lab, except this time, there's flashy lights everywhere, tons of hostile beasts to remove from the board, and a disgusting robotic abomination to dismantle circuit board by circuit board after all is said and done. He looks to his right and notices that there's a whole bunch of wooden planks haphazardly nailed across a doorway to block anyone from going in or out of there. Whatever's behind those planks must either be a threat to someone's life or simply a part of the CORE that's out of order. He doesn't feel any need to try and bother himself with removing the planks to discover the reason behind it, so he simply ignores it and looks to the doorway on his left instead, completely open and leading deeper into the CORE, which he walks through.
Blue pillars made of dark blue metal plates with a flashing red light on top line the path ahead leading to a black cloaked wizard monster known as, "Madjick". They wear a large hat and boots with a slightly curved tip at the end where the toes would be. The moment Skyler starts coming close, they float up into the air and immediately start attacking by shooting a magic orb at him. He's on his toes thankfully and before the orb hits him, he swings his pan in a similar manner to how a baseball bat is swung and whacks it away, sending it right back to its owner at double the speed. They weren't expecting him to do this and instead of avoiding it, they get hit by it, causing them to quickly flip over multiple times in the air. While this happens, he takes this opportunity to run up to them and with an overhead swing, uses the inside part of the pan to blast his wizardly opponent to their doom. The impact makes Madjick hit the ground hard and they stop moving for a few seconds before turning into dust, allowing the boy to continue his journey through the CORE.
The next room is completely uneventful. A long path across an abyss made of glass tiles with different colored flashing lights leads him deeper and deeper, though nobody guards this area sadly, leaving him unsatisfied by hid previous encounter. Walking across the tiles with disco-light patterns flashing underfoot, he notices that there's a couple machines on either side that are completely deactivated, looking quite similar to the laser machines Alphys had used on him during their fight. He doesn't notice that on the wall to his left before walking onto the path, there's a button that's switched on to deactivate these lasers, most definitely Flowey's work of solving whatever puzzle that sat here, which is something he had been doing to help him throughout his entire journey. He keeps walking and enters into a hallway, and as he approaches a crossroad to go either right or up, he's ambushed by two monsters in heavy armor known as "Knight Knight" launching their heavy spiked weapons at him.
Two morning star balls fly at him, which he narrowly avoids by jumping out of the way at the last possible moment. He would've easily avoided it well before the spiked metal balls came even close to him, but thanks to the ambush he almost got hit by it. Now that he's got these two in his sights, he makes note of their appearance, an avian face on their chests alongside their deadly weapons and thick plated, black armor. It doesn't matter how much armor they put on, his will is strong enough to pierce through anything, and as they both start swinging at him once again, he skillfully dodges and weaves around the deadly spiked balls. He gets closer and closer, and one of these knights attempts to smash him with an overhead swing from their weapon, and instead of him taking the attack, he jumps over it and retaliates with a strong whack of his frying pan upon landing on the ground. The force is so strong that it actually knocks this behemoth Knight Knight on their back and the sound of metal clashing together echoes through the halls of the corridor.
The other Knight Knight turns to face him, only to get a face full of pain upon doing so, which makes them drop their weapon and grab the area where Skyler whacked them, trying to subdue the pain. This completely opens them up for another attack and he takes it, flipping the pan over and using the handle to stab them in a soft, exposed spot in their armor. They roar in pain for a moment and quickly turn into a large cloud of dust that falls to the floor. He looks back to the other knight and while he was fighting, they ended up turning into dust as well. Not even the most elite knights in this world can stop him now. He flips the pan around and holds it by the handle with his left hand and quickly moves on, continuing to walking through the hallway, reaching the end a moment later and turning right at the corner.
A long wooden bridge awaits him with countless inactive laser machines lining the left side. If they were all active, he's sure that this would be quite the challenge to get through, but they're not and it's better this way since he won't have to waste valuable time prancing about with dumb puzzles. As he walks along this lonely bridge, he peers over the railing to see what's below him out of curiosity. A faint yellow glow comes from what appears to be a deep pool of water easily more than 100 feet under the bridge, and it makes him realize something. The CORE is in a place where there's tons of magma all over, and up on the surface, he's heard of special facilities where they convert the heat energy from pools of magma deep underground into electricity as a means of generating clean energy. If his suspicion is correct, the CORE might be a facility with similar functions to it and if he can find the central controls for the entire place, he could entice a catastrophic failure by messing everything up… a result that would most certainly take out nearly the entire Underground and catch all those he might have missed due to not having access to them. Though his entire face is nearly blacked out by a shadow, he smiles wide at this thought and his stride hastens, eager to find this control room and bring this idea into reality.
His quickened pace nets him closer and closer to the end, though he also has no idea that right behind him, he's being followed by someone he can't see. Someone who had been with him for the entire journey and he never even knew it, though he did get a quick glimpse of them back in Waterfall. They watch the boy run off and round a corner, leaving their line of sight, standing there silently with an eerie smile on their face with few drops of a strange black liquid slowly dripping down onto their ghastly chin. This apparition has been mystified by this boy's behavior the entire time since he first fell into the Underground, and while they have no direct means of making their presence known to him or affect anything he might do right now, they know that it's only a matter of time before they'll finally get to properly meet him. They look to their left and float off the bridge and through a wall, attempting to catch up with him to see how everything will play out.
"Skyler. LV 18. Time - 506:36. CORE - Central Crossroad. File saved." The black and white textbox he's seen countless times throughout his journey continues to tell him what he wants to know without him ever asking for it. "32 left." Still tons of foolish creatures to send to heaven, so little time to do it. He drops his right hand out from under the SAVE star that he was holding and stands in the center of a 4-way crossroad. There are two electronic signs on the walls in front of him with green text that he could read, and absolutely no means of knowing exactly where to go, so he walks up to one of the signs and reads it. "North, the warrior's path. Northwest, The mastermind's path. West, the sage's path. North and West lead to the end. The mastermind's path must be opened through another way." As cryptic as one could possibly get in terms of describing locations, though he understands exactly where to go.
He chooses to go west, perhaps there's a clue along the way that will help him reach the mastermind's path since he believes that is where the central control room might be located. He walks over a small wooden bridge and below him, he can see that the liquid he was looking at before was indeed a pool of water, and the flickering yellow glow from this pool is stronger now since the surface of the water is much closer this time around. He can see a small amount of water evaporating into steam that slowly rises up into the air around him. He can feel the intense heat from the water despite being on the bridge far away from it, and it causes him to wipe his forehead with his right hand in response to it, the humidity level in this area is sky high. He continues to walk down the path, turning right and heading north. Each step he takes brings him closer to 5 new monsters guarding a branching path on the left that has a different colored floor compared to the path he's on. All 5 of these monsters immediately notice his approach and ready themselves to fight.
Foolish warriors block his path in the hopes they'll have the power to stop him. What they look like doesn't matter in any way because he'll get through them no matter what. Butterflies scatter pollen and dance around furiously, flies swarm in the thousands, magic orbs bounce around with more vigor than bouncy balls, but through every attack thrown at him, dust continues to follow in his wake. In a matter of seconds, every monster that stood in his way had been reduced to piles of useless dust that can't protect anything. Now that the path is clear, he can proceed and see what exactly they were guarding. A sign sits on the wall in the entrance of the path that reads, "The puzzle is solved… The mastermind's path is now open and The End awaits!" Whatever lies ahead had been solved for him, there's no reason to be here and he can continue heading north to see where the mastermind's path leads though he makes mental note of The End being open for him, too.
He comes across a new path after a couple seconds of walking. The floor to this path is black has a stairwell leading down into darkness. He doesn't care if there's monsters waiting for him down here, he'll kill anything that tries to stop him without a second thought. He puts his right hand out to hold onto the railing as he descends the stairs, silently chuckling to himself with malicious intent in each faint laugh he emits. A minute or so of stair descent later, he reaches the bottom and a long hallway awaits him decorated with red lamps hanging on both sides of the wall illuminating the path for him. He walks down this hallway, nobody in the Underground can stop him from putting his plan into motion, not like anyone could at this point. All those who had the potential of stopping him have either been killed, died trying to kill him, or ran away as they know they don't have the power to defeat a human whose strength has far exceeded that of any monster alive now. His rusty red eyes open up to view a large control panel coming into view with each step he takes towards the end of the hallway, The End is surely near in more ways than one.
The hallway opens up to an expansive room full of pipes running all across the ceiling, the walls, and into the glowing pool of water below. This room is sweltering in all aspects, but he's about to make it go from sweltering to infernal once he's done with everything here. He finally reaches the control panel and looks at every single button there is on it. Some of the buttons are lit up, others are completely dim, while one button is blinking on and off in a perfectly set pattern that could be considered mesmerizing. The control panel also has a screen filled with statistical information about everything going on in the CORE on the mechanical side, as well as stuff like energy expenditure, energy output levels, conversion process stability, and temperature. "ENERGY OUTPUT LEVEL: 7.8/10 MGW. ENERGY EXPENDITURE: 601 MKW. CORE TEMPERATURE: 296F. CORE REACTOR STABILITY: SLIGHT INSTABILITY DETECTED. GEOTHERMAL-MAGICAL CONVERSION PROCESS: STABLE. CORE STATUS 1. RECOMMENDED COURSE OF ACTION: DECREASE HEATING RATE, INCREASE COOLANT FLOW RATE."
Since the CORE is an over-glorified power plant with some sort of reactor, it uses the heat from the magma in Hotlands to warm the water physically contained within a special area in the CORE until it evaporates into steam, which in turn, is used to turn a turbine to generate magical electricity through an additional, unknown conversion process. Although electricity on the surface is measured in watts, kilowatts, and megawatts, he has no idea of what a MGW or MKW is, and considering how the current headroom leftover for energy output is 2.2 MGWs, it might not take much to overwork and overheat some of the core components that keep everything stable. Considering there's a sensor for pressure levels, it might be possible to not only cause a mass meltdown from overloading the conversion process, but also create a hydrothermal explosion by raising the pressure to levels that are highly unstable. His smile widens, his pupils dilate in joy, and his right hand raises up to start touching buttons in the hopes he can make everything go out of control. Thankfully, all the buttons are labelled in a way that makes it possible for even the stupidest person to understand and he starts pressing all the right buttons to make the CORE become a ticking time bomb of epic proportions. First, he adjusts the energy output levels to their maximum limit of 10 MGWs, which immediately causes the text on screen to reflect the results of this change. "ENERGY OUTPUT CHANGED TO 10 MGW, MAXIMUM. EXPECTED ENERGY EXPENDITURE: 1 MGW, CURRENTLY 880 MKW. PREDICTED CORE TEMPERATURE: 619F." And immediately after setting these changes, he gets to work changing the flow and heating rates to accommodate this. " COOLANT FLOW RATE CHANGED TO MINIMUM."
Almost immediately after making these changes, the text on the screen turns red to reflect these dramatic changes. "DANGER! INSUFFICIENT COOLANT LEVELS TO REACTOR CORE DETECTED! CORE STRUCTURE IS AT RISK OF BEING BREACHED THROUGH A TOTAL MELTDOWN! CORE STATUS RAISED TO LEVEL 3! INCREASE COOLANT FLOW RATE IMMEDIATELY!" to which he takes no heed in doing. He continues to watch as numbers rise higher and higher, some of them turning yellow while others turn red. The temperature of the room he's in starts to rise quite fast, and it gets high enough to where Skyler can see the heat radiating from the liquid below where he's standing, and deep within him, he starts thinking that maybe it's not the best idea since this could kill him if it goes too fast. This thought is quickly put aside as he plans on running through the CORE and to the end the moment everything starts going bonkers. (0)
(2) He decides to finally increase the energy conversion rate to maximum, and the moment he does that, a whole bunch of numbers on-screen start rising rapidly and the sound of metal creaking echoes from deep within accompanies it. He looks up at the ceiling, noticing that most of the pipes are starting to glow a deep shade of red from how hot they've become when suddenly, the text on the screen changes and an extremely loud alarm starts blaring with flashing red lights above kicking in. "WARNING! WARNING! CORE PRESSURE UNSTABLE! CONVERSION PROCESS UNSTABLE! ELECTRO-MAGIC REACTOR CORE MELTDOWN IMMINENT! CORE STATUS RAISED TO LEVEL 5! EVACUATE ALL CORE PERSONNEL IMMEDIATELY! REPEAT: EVACUATE ALL CORE PERSONNEL IMMEDIATELY!" And right after he finishes reading this, a couple pipes overhead burst and start spewing raw molten magma into the water contained below. The reaction from this is an insanely fast evaporation that roars to life with a massive tempest of steam rising up from below that nearly burns Skyler in the process with how close it was. He almost falls back on his butt and flinches in response to this, and now that he's achieved what he wanted to achieve, it's time to finally leave before he becomes a steamy mess of soup. He doesn't look back at anything that might be on-screen now and simply books it into the hallway, emergency sirens blaring and red lights flashing to warn any and all who still reside within to evacuate or face total destruction of their life.
The boy, leaving a trail of dust as he moves, dashes up the stairs and runs for the end to make his planned escape from the nuclear level destruction he's set in motion. The moment he makes it to the top of the stairs, he's able to get a small taste of just exactly what his destructive touch has caused. The level of water that resides below has risen higher thanks to magma breaching into the pool and boiling it, turning the calm, serene surface become more volatile and violent than even he could comprehend. Countless bubbles created from water evaporating within itself float up and pop upon reaching the top, scattering waves all over and spitting flesh sizzling droplets all around. The sound of heavy metal bending and flexing is heard, the entire place may collapse before any explosion occurs, though he doesn't care if it blows or not since nobody can survive without electricity.
The soles of his shoes hastily push him forward on his rush to the end, and while running as fast as his legs can carry him, one of the pipes that carries water to the generator chamber bursts and sends a shrapnel of metal all over. Luckily, Skyler is nowhere near it when this happens but it causes a massive flood of water to flow out of the wall and onto the path ahead of him, blocking him from where he has to go. This water is absolutely infernal in temp and touching it would not help him at all though he can jump over it and with a running start, barely manages to jump over the massive puddle created. He wastes no time looking at it and continues onward. He rounds the corner and comes face to face with a group of 7 monsters who are all looking a bit stressed and panicked over the sudden change in situation. His left hand tightens up and he rushes at them, swinging at everything in his way. It's either him or them, and a quick, painless death by his hand is much more merciful than the universe melting destruction that's going to engulf all of them shortly, and in the blink of an eye, he's killed all of them and dashed off down the hall.
He manages to find himself at the 4-way crossroads, the path straight north is now flooded by a bunch of leaking pipes that've burst through the metal walls. He has no option but to continue going down the path leading east, and as he jumps over the SAVE star that's of no use or help to him, he hears an explosion happen nearby. The entire ground rocks for almost a second as a blast of fire briefly appears right in front of his face along with a whole bunch of debris that almost impale him if he were even an inch closer to the path they flew through. A bunch of lights and circuitry within the wall was heated up by the intense environmental change and it caused it to violently short itself out in the process, causing the explosion. He sturdies his resolve and presses onward, ignoring the highly dangerous situation he's created for himself.
He takes a sharp left, his feet sliding to the right as he does a small drift to quickly get around the corner, another explosion happens behind him and he ducks down to avoid a blast of debris. Among the alarms, he can hear more explosions happening deeper within the halls of the CORE. He can't dwell on this and watch it happen, so he continues running headfirst into a roadblock of 10 enemies blocking the final crossroad to The End, all ready to brawl but just like how the sirens had warned them to evacuate or die, all of them die due to the demonic strength the boy has attained from everything he's done thus far. He blasts off down the east and comes across the final bridge he needs to cross in order to get to the elevator that'll bring him to the capital and away from the nuclear blast that'll be detonating soon. On the bridge are the 10 last warriors whose fate has already been sealed the moment they dedicated their life to stopping the boy, and with a frying pan waving through the fire and the flames of the earth's angry wrath, piles of dust are left behind, never to be found by anyone ever again once the sirens fall silent.
He makes it all the way to the end of the bridge and on the other side is a SAVE star that he quickly uses. "Skyler. LV 19. Time - 522:38. CORE - The End. File saved." He knows that the next thing would be, "Determination. Kindness." so he doesn't waste any time in sticking around to see that and he runs into the doorway in front of him (0) The room he runs into is dark and this makes him stop immediately to allow himself to get a bearing on where he's ended up. Behind him, he hears the sirens screaming so he can't go back there, however, in the middle of the room lies the only monster left that can possibly stop him, Mettaton. The boy slowly approaches him, knowing that this metal abomination is just one more count to add to his total kills, and he's definitely not sticking around to fight him for hours on end. He stops a few feet in front of the rectangular metal machine, staring into his screen for a few moments before he speaks up. "MY MY, YOU'VE FINALLY ARRIVED. I HAVE TO SAY THAT YOU SURE KNOW HOW TO MAKE AN ENTRANCE, SETTING THE CORE TO GO OFF AT ANY SECOND… BUT ENOUGH OF THAT. AFTER WE HAD OUR FIRST MEETING, I REALIZED… SOMETHING GHASTLY."
The boy raises his frying pan up slightly above his waist, he doesn't have time to deal with any bullcrap from some ego driven macintosh computer, though Mettaton doesn't stop. "YOU'RE NOT JUST A THREAT TO MONSTERS… BUT TO HUMANITY AS WELL. OH MY. THAT'S QUITE AN ISSUE. YOU SEE, I CAN'T BE A STAR WITHOUT AN AUDIENCE, AND BESIDES, THERE ARE SOME PEOPLE I WANT TO PROTECT." The boy takes a single step forward, annoyed with the useless banter. Mettaton notices this. "AH HA HA. EAGER AS ALWAYS, EH? BUT DON'T THINK FOR ONE SECOND YOU'VE GOT THE UPPER HAND, THERE'S SOMETHING YOU HAVEN'T ACCOUNTED FOR. ANY TRUE FAN OF MYSELF KNOWS THAT I WAS CREATED WITH THE INTENT THAT I'D BE A HUMAN ERADICATION ROBOT. IT WAS ONLY AFTER BECOMING THE STAR OF THE UNDERGROUND THAT I WAS GIVEN A MORE… HOW DO I SAY, GLAMOUROUS BODY. HOWEVER, ALPHYS NEVER COMPLETELY REMOVE THOSE ORIGINAL FUNCTIONS… COME ANY CLOSER, AND I'LL BE FORCED TO SHOW YOU…" his hands come out from behind his back as he attempts to strike an intimidating pose, "MY TRUE FORM!" It doesn't do anything and the boy simply takes another step forward. He put his hands behind his back again. "FINE THEN! RRRRRRRRREADY!? IT'S SHOWTIME!"
Mettaton's time to shine has come, but will he truly be able to stop Skyler or will he fall to the same fate as everyone else? As always, reviews are always appreciated but don't be mean! I hope you enjoyed and I'll seeya in the next chapter!