Chapter 7: 'Heart' Surgery
"so... let me get this straight," Sans began, expression perfectly neutral, "you want me to infiltrate your magical government's main headquarters, get past all the security, to somehow find your wand. with no plan beyond 'just do it'."
Sirius nodded.
Sans slowly closed his eye sockets, brought his hands in front of his face as if he were praying, and sighed dramatically.
Sirius resisted the urge to fidget. (No, that's a lie. He fidgeted a lot.)
Then: "well, i mean sure. why not. no big." The skeleton was all grins again, swinging his arms back down to his sides with a flourish and rocking back on his heels. His pink slippers made little flop sounds on the grass.
"Wait, are you serious?" That got a rather funny response from Sans: a loud cough and a small two-handed wave, as if cueing something. Sirius caught on fairly quickly. "No, I didn't— I know, I'm Sirius, but are you? 'Serious'?"
"i gotcha', yeah."
"…I thought convincing you would be far more work."
Sans just shrugged, yawning. "you know how i feel about work."
"True enough." He wasn't about to look this gift horse in the mouth, choosing instead to continue with his explanation. "Alright. Tomorrow we teleport into London: somewhere close to the Ministry but not so close that I'd be recognized by some witch or wizard heading in to work. After that we get in and somehow find my wand. Any ideas?"
Some cricket in the meadow had the best comedic timing, apparently, giving a few prominent chirps to accent the complete silence that followed his question.
Eventually Sans said, "ya know… i might be able to recognize your wand by your magic. i can recognize people at a distance by their SOULs, so why not."
"That's… convenient." Sirius distractedly rubbed at his chest. "Do you need to check my soul to be able to find it more easily?"
The skeleton considered correcting the only-sorta-incorrect pronunciation of those two words, before deciding it wasn't really worth it. "i routed through your SOUL when i made the shortcut outa' the void, but since things went a tad pear-shaped on re-entry, so to speak, that might be for the best."
"And you're sure it won't hurt?"
"yes, i'm just looking. we've been over this right?"
"Excuse me for being cautious with my immortal soul, Rattles. It's only the intrinsic culmination of my entire being, necessary for my continued existence." The once-and-returned prankster was really laying on the snark.
"well… i—" Sans wiped away an imaginary tear, trumping Sirius's sass with false dramatics. "if you really d-don't trust me…"
Of course he had done absolutely nothing about his skull-wide grin, spoiling the image. Sirius tried to give him a friendly whack on the head but missed, laughing in his rambunctious way. "I trust you, you absolute git! But, uhm, let's deal with that tomorrow: it's getting late."
Yawning hugely, Sans teasingly retorted, "gee sirius, if that's the excuse you're rolling with, alright then. besides, when it's an option, sleep isn't something i care to refuse." He plopped himself down on the grass right where he stood, conveniently (and purposefully) slipping underneath Sirius's second smack attempt.
Denied his petty revenge for the quip, Sirius had to make do with a long-suffering eye roll as he trudged over to a nearby tree. It should make a decent enough place to sleep: it wasn't that cold, and there were probably only a few hours until dawn. Not to mention that the cold wouldn't even be an issue once he shifted into Padfoot. "Good night, then."
No response. Sans had already fallen asleep.
Figures.
Sirius circled his chosen sleep-spot a few times, stomping down the grass and kicking aside any large rocks found in the area, only letting himself slump down and curl up once he was satisfied with his prep. Then, with the ease of long practice, he pushed familiar magic down his limbs, sliding it through his flesh and bones and changing them as it passed. It only took seconds for Sirius the human to be replaced by the large, shaggy hound Padfoot (though hilariously still wearing his shirt and trousers, having been too tired to include his overclothes in the transformation).
So, with Buckbeak's occasional huffed snore and Sans's rare but long-since-become-familiar rattles, Sirius drifted to sleep.
=X=X=X=
The next day dawned brisk, bright, and far too early for Sans's tastes.
Laying on his back, he watched as the sky slowly began to brighten: black shifting to blue-gray. Mist was creeping through the forest, lit in soft colors that muted the surroundings. It layered the air in the small clearing and beyond, thick and encompassing yet delicate in a strangely fragile way. Cold morning dew glistened on the grass around him, twinkling gently in diffused sunlight. Moisture seeped into the fabric of his clothes, slippers included, and he could feel a few trickles of water tracing lines down his bones before reaching the ground. Some drops rolled off his brow and into his eye sockets.
He blinked in discomfort and sat up.
It wasn't the void.
Well geeze, obviously… It felt odd to actually acknowledge that fact. After the timeless, unchanging black, it felt odd to watch the world around him change slowly, strange and wonderful to watch as color began to fill his surroundings. The air was brisk and distinctly alive: a barely noticeable breeze slipping through the grass.
A huffed, sleepy sounding oh-boy-I'm-gonna-catch-the-ball bark—he had gotten pretty good at recognizing barks over the years and non-years he'd spent in Snowdin—drew Sans's attention to a dog curled up at the base of a tree.
It was wearing clothes.
Not that dogs wearing clothes was a new concept: that was old hat.
Grinning to himself in appreciation of the almost-accidental pun, Sans continued to regard the strangely familiar canine. A brief glance around the clearing revealed that it was only himself, the feathered creature (monster?) who had carried Sirius, and the dog. Sirius himself wasn't there.
The dog was wearing his clothes.
So unless some random dog had stolen Sirius's clothes and put them on… well, from what he had heard about this world that was unlikely. Curious, Sans ran a basic CHECK on the dog, brushing his magic up against the dog's SOUL and pulling back vague but familiar impressions of orange and purple. Thus the question became: Sirius is a dog now? Which admittedly wasn't much of a question, but given the distinct lack of answers he figured it summed it all up quite nicely.
"you better not gnaw on me when i wake you up, fuzz-butt."
With that remark snarked at his oblivious friend, Sans figured he should actually get up. He pushed himself to his feet, taking a moment to smack as much damp soil and grass off of his clothes as he could. Less straight-up dirty but still wet, the skeleton mosied over to the sleeping dog. He hoped he didn't actually need to worry about his friend trying to take a bite out of him but, since he really didn't want to risk it, Sans grabbed a conveniently sized stick and poked the sleeping hound with it.
Sirius growled groggily, then just rolled belly-up.
"wakey wakey, sirius." He prodded the dog again. "if i'm gonna need to be up, i can't just let sleeping dogs lie, man."
That earned him a bark—more of a 'boof' sound, really—but at least Sirius flipped himself back over, regarding Sans with one droopy, still-asleep eye. The eye slid shut. Then, after a significant pause, flashed back open again. Sirius leapt to his feet (or paws), tripping on his sleeves and pants in the process, and began barking at nothing in particular.
Sans assumed that, had the barks been in plain english, it would still have been hard to make sense of him.
He also assumed that Sirius had honestly forgotten—or perhaps didn't notice—that he was currently a dog. That was based on his brief expression of doggy confusion, followed by belated realization, a disgruntled growl, and a long stretch. The stretch shifted into a seamless transformation from dog to human, but the image was ruined when Sirius promptly face-planted onto the moist morning grass. He had already looked extremely rumpled, and when he flopped himself onto his back it was clear that he now had additional dirt smears.
Lovely.
"Merlin, Sans, did you really need to stab me awake?" he grumbled.
The skeleton shrugged. "hey, you were a dog and i am literally made of bones. i wasn't about to risk it."
It seemed like Sirius was going to retort, mouth already open with words on his tongue, before he reconsidered. "Fine, point taken."
"anyway… you… were a dog."
"Of course! Some of us have skin, you know, and I didn't relish the idea of a long freezing night without blankets."
"that answers nothing." Sans rolled his eye-lights. "should i just assume 'wizards' and leave it at that?"
He looked mildly affronted, but his tone was full of humor when he replied, "Not all wizards can do that, Rattles, so at least give me some credit! I just happen to be a very skilled Animagus."
"'wizards' it is, then."
"Fine," Sirius conceded, still a bit miffed but deciding to move the topic along. "Besides that, we have schemes to scheme. And you still need to do your freaky floaty heart magic thing on me, too."
"hmm… yeah."
At that glowing and confidence-inspiring response, Sans pointed one boney finger at his friend and quickly flicked it back toward himself. To Sirius, the quiet meadow suddenly dimmed, and while it was still clearly visible it felt somehow… distanced. An interesting tingly feeling ran down Sirius's spine, branching out and racing along every nerve but leaving his chest numb. In front of him appeared…
Well, it was a heart.
It was just… overlapped by another one. A slightly larger one, a bit off-center and a bit more vibrant.
Both were smeared with the same nasty black residue that had clung on to Sans's. The guck all but filled up the space between the hearts, even splattering out on the outermost layer.
It made Sirius feel like he needed to take, oh, say fifty showers. And twenty baths, just to be sure.
"ooh, ew. that's—"
"ECH!" The disgusted wizard made to claw the nastiness away, but his hand was caught in a soft blue-bordering-on-cyan outline and stopped in place.
"not a good idea, ex-fuzz-butt," Sans reprimanded. "let me deal with it. 'intrinsic culmination of your entire being', remember?"
Sirius was suitably spooked and, though he still wanted to grab the filthy heart and wring it out like a soaked towel, he lowered his hand with a nod. Instead he examined the hearts with morbid fascination. "So that's what twelve years of Dementor exposure looks like," he said drily. "I'm guessing there's two because of dimension-time-travel nonsense."
"probably."
Another gesture from Sans drifted the SOUL amalgamation closer to him, hovering it above plain grass instead of Sirius's chest. Almost lazily, he set the hearts to spinning and studied how the black mass shifted. There was a long pause as he looked it over.
"ok, bad news and good news. good news is i can get rid of the stuff."
"I'm guessing the bad news has to do with that."
The skeleton shrugged. "the bad news may or may not be bad… it might hurt."
"That doesn't sound too bad…" Sirius narrowed his eyes, waiting for the other shoe to drop.
"well…"
Ah. There is was.
"so by 'might' i mean 'nearly guaranteed' and by 'hurt' i mean 'SOUL-rendingly painful'. temporary, of course. and there is a slight chance you won't even feel anything. like a 0.001% chance, optimistically speaking."
Sirius was obviously not pleased by this.
Drops of the inky residue leaked and fell, usually disintegrating into nothingness before hitting the ground. A few hit the grass, sucking out its color and shriveling the plant to ash. Staring at the dripping stain, his expression hardened.
"Get me a stick."
"you kinda lost me there," Sans said, cocking his head in a mixture of confusion and interest. Still, he flicked his wrist and snapped off a tree branch about as thick as a finger and as long as his forearm.
Sirius brushed off the comment and gave the stick an experimental bite.
"…uh, you don't look like a dog anymore."
The wizard rolled his eyes and quipped, "It's so I won't bite my own tongue off, smart arse," before shoving the stick back in to his mouth with a grimace. He steeled himself, and then nodded his permission to Sans.
Sans took a deep breath—lungs or no, it helped—and began delicately waving his fingers as if conducting a silent orchestra. Thin strands of cyan stretched from each fingertip, crossed the short distance, and painlessly pierced through the larger heart. Now with access to the dark mass, he began to darken the ends of his threads into a rich blue color to coat it with, careful to keep the layer of magic as thin as he could. When it accidentally brushed against the outer SOUL, Sirius winced violently with a sharp hiss.
It would be painful, then.
The skeleton directed his blue magic with all the finesse he had gained over years and years and reset after reset of practice, carefully wrapping up every speck of the residue. He regarded his work with a keen eye (so to speak).
At length, Sans asked, "remember that pain just now?"
"Un-hun," grunted Sirius with a twitch.
"would you prefer that pain drawn out for quite a while, or pain a magnitude or so greater all at once?"
Silence.
Sirius's eyes were wide as he gnawed on his stick, thinking about this choice between two evils. Neither seemed particularly less evil, but… at least one would end fast. "Schekond," he managed to spit out.
With a grimace, Sans nodded.
"ok."
He turned his boney hand, palm open to the ground, and shoved down.
The stain was ripped from the double heart. It was torn and scattered and vanished.
There might have been screaming. Sirius couldn't tell. He couldn't hear anything but burning pain and starbursts of screeching white noise. Wood, he tasted. Wood and copper—blood. He had blood. It burned in his veins. It burned outside of his veins, somewhere floating above him, beating. Freezing fire stabbed him from those burning distant veins. Was he—?
He was.
He wasn't.
He burned. Froze.
Woke up. Numb.
"Ow," he said, but his voice came out as a gravely croak.
Sans looked like he was a split second away from doing something, hands jittery in that way that clearly means he didn't know what to do with them. After seeing Sirius's bleary, half-open eyes looking at him, however, he quickly stilled himself. "right, the stick was a good idea."
"Thi-nk?" His voice was snarky, despite the fact that he had to force the word out through his aching throat and past the stick. He wrenched his jaw open, teeth pulling from deep bite-marks with jolting pain, and spat the abused branch to the side. It had cut his gums, he noticed. A few swallows and deep breaths had him feeling much more in order.
They sat in silence for a while. Sirius took the chance to cautiously wriggle his fingers, pleasantly surprised to find not even the barest trace of pain. It seems the only things that still hurt were his teeth and his throat.
"How… long?"
"well, about a second's worth of obvious agony, then maybe two minutes still as the grave. scared me to death."
"As a… skeleton," Sirius managed between breaths, "aren't you… already… dead?"
"do i look dead to you?"
Sirius gave him a blank look.
Sans looked down at himself, shrugged, and decided to change the subject. "your SOUL lined itself up once the goop was gone. that's probably a good thing."
Another minute of companionable silence and the recumbent wizard decided it was high time to sit up. "Merlin… It better."
"plus i got a great read on your magic signature."
"Great." He pushed himself to his feet, standing a bit unsteadily. "Now we can… get to London… and I can get some… breakfast."
"priorities, man."
"Breakfast is… always top priority. I know a place." He paused, thinking, and added, "I'm pretty sure I have enough… money to get you something, too. You'll like it."
Sirius gestured for Sans to come closer. The skeleton grabbed his wrist, catching on fast: since he didn't know how to get to London, Sirius would need play guide again.
Then again, he really couldn't let that chance pass him by. "but sirius…"
That cheeky wink, Sirius thought. He could guess where this was headed.
"i don't think i'll have the stomach for it."
Even though he was expecting it, he couldn't help but chuckle. A peculiar tingling sensation swept up his arm from where Sans held his wrist, the odd feeling he had begun to associate with his friend's teleportation magic, and quickly focused on a rarely used Apparition point near the café he wanted to visit.
He did, however, spare enough of a thought to say simply: "Food, Rattles. Food. When was the last time I ate?"
Sans just grinned.
They vanished between blinks, leaving the clearing empty save for the half-awake Hippogriff now staring at the spot where they had stood with interest and slight confusion.
Author's Note:
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or Undertale.
Happy New Year!
You know, Sans and Sirius do get along rather well. I wonder if that has anything to do with Sirius being able to turn into a dog. 'Cause I mean everyone knows about dogs and bones, amiright?
You can change the dog into a wizard, but you can't take the dog out of the wizard.
…That didn't make much sense, did it.
Thanks to everyone who has left a review!
EmPro8: Very carefully.
Ryly Sorbito: Yep, Sans is all lower-caps. If I could it'd be in the right font, but oh well (on AO3 it is… so that's neat).
See ya on the flipside, everyone!
