Chapter 56: Seriously
Dragons.
Harry sped through the castle as fast as he dared, trying to keep his footsteps quiet as he passed dozing portraits and the occasional sleepy ghost. He didn't run into any prefects or professors—other than Karkaroff, whom he had literally run into earlier. It had been sheer dumb luck that the headmaster had assumed he'd tripped over something other than an invisibly sneaking student.
Dragons.
He felt a little stupid, to be perfectly honest: he had known that the first task would involve dragons—or at least that it could—ever since Sirius had warned him about what he'd be getting himself into by agreeing to compete. He'd known.
He shouldn't be freaking out.
But the only dragon he'd ever seen before tonight had been a little baby, only able to spit small sparks. As it turns out, trying to extrapolate from that experience to a fully grown adult dragon was not sufficient.
The dragons in the forest had been chained forces of nature, breathing great plumes of flame into the sky with every enraged roar. Fifty-feet tall, with horns and fangs and fire and… and he was expected to face one with nothing but his wand!
Dragons!
How was he supposed to deal with that?
He wasn't heading back to Gryffindor tower, not yet. Instead he took a rarely used staircase toward a certain empty classroom that he very much hoped wasn't actually empty at the moment. Even if it was already well past midnight.
Harry rounded a corner, and he spotted the door. No light coming out from under it, that's not a good sign—
No, wait, there is light there.
Tugging the invisibility cloak off over his head, he threw open the door.
"Dragons!?"
"there's a stick and some leaves in your hair," Sans blinked, grinned to himself, then added, "hair-y."
After dislodging the foliage with a agitated jerk, Harry continued, "I just… I kind of thought he was exaggerating, they can't seriously expect…" He gestured vaguely in the direction of the forest, fistful of cloak flapping with the motion. "I mean… Dragons?!"
"Calm down, pup. What's wrong?"
"I think that's obvious, it's—" Harry cut himself off, blinking at the colorful wizard who had asked the question. "Sirius?"
"yeah," Sans cut in almost before he finished saying the name. "really serious."
Sirius—or Patrick Pawdy, rather, given his current appearance—frowned slightly, a worried crease on his brow. "Please tell me I didn't forget to warn you about the dragons…"
"Uhm, no, you told me." Harry swallowed, shifting his grip on slick fabric. "It's still absolutely mad though. I mean, hearing about the dragons is one thing, but seeing them really made it… well, real."
"really puts things in scale, right?"
"Ugh, Sans."
It was at that moment that Harry realized the other elephant in the room—or the snake, to be more accurate. "Wait, Warrington?"
"Hello, Potter."
"Hello."
Silence—for a second, at least, and then Sans couldn't hold back amused chuckles at their stilted exchange. It was, admittedly, a little embarrassing. But the older student was still a Slytherin: and not only that, he seemed to be a cooperative one. Harry hadn't thought that variety even existed at all.
It had been a few weeks since Warrington had proposed that the champions work together, and Harry still wasn't sure how that would pan out.
Not because he had misgivings—even though he kind of did—but rather…
Well.
The school was taking sides.
And, surprisingly, it wasn't necessarily against Harry: given his experience in second year, he had been bracing for the worst. Instead, it was as if the usual Gryffindor versus Slytherin rivalry had spread and infected the rest of the school. A lot of students had started wearing badges on their robes: red or green, and typically charmed to change between support for one champion and insults for the other.
Basically, people were acting the way they might before a key Quidditch match, except it was everybody, every day.
He was fairly certain some of the older Gryffindors would hex him if they found out he was cooperating with a snake.
"So… uh," Harry tried, looking between the three of them. "What's he doing here?"
"He's right here, you know," the Slytherin muttered.
"we're conspiring against the government."
"What?"
"No, we're not," Sirius interjected, tipping up the brim of the ridiculous floppy hat he was wearing. "It's best to take things one issue at a time, you know, so there's still a while until— you know what, we're just getting off topic now."
Harry blinked, processing that implication. His godfather just shrugged, a smile playing about his lips, and let the topic lie.
"I've been recruited into their little gang, so they were informing me of the pitfalls we're sure to encounter," said Warrington, the only one to provide an actual answer. He adjusted the green blanket draped over his shoulders; it was pretty obviously the comforter from his fourposter bed, though Harry had no idea why he had it here. "One would think they could have chosen a more reasonable hour to do so, but alas."
"Recruited?" Harry echoed.
"yep."
"Our faction against evildoers grows ever larger," Sirius dramatically declared, "and soon the vile scourge will be wiped from—"
"point is," Sans interrupted, "cass is on our side."
And in this case, Harry realized, 'our side' meant quite a bit more than a simple agreement to work together for the tournament. He had to swallow back a sudden spike of envy; Sirius had been upfront about the whole situation, including the fact that he couldn't tell him everything.
Was that the same for Warrington?
"So," Sirius began, thankfully moving things back on-topic, "it's still dragons."
In what seemed to be a comedically exaggerated move, Sans elbowed the colorful wizard in the side; he coughed in a very not-suspicious manner and nodded.
Weird.
Harry blinked. "Uh, 'still'?"
"the task might've changed since then."
"How did you find out about the dragons, anyway?"
"Met Hagrid in Hogsmeade, and he told me to meet him at his cottage at midnight. Uhm, with my cloak." Harry shifted, nodding to the bundled fabric in his arms. "Madam Maxime was there, too, and he took her to see the dragons in the forest."
"Beauxbatons knows, then."
"And Durmstrang." At the questioning looks he got, Harry awkwardly added, "I… ran into Professor Karkaroff on my way back to the castle."
Warrington shrugged. "We would have told Krum anyway."
"Would we… not tell Fleur?"
He grimaced—or at least, Harry thought it was a grimace. It was a sort of wince-frown, as if the Slytherin was conflicted on the answer. "I suppose we would have," he replied, after a moment, "even though she declined our offer."
"So… we will tell her?"
"Her headmaster will take care of that, I'm sure."
"i'll send her a note or something if you're worried, harry," said Sans, somewhat distractedly. He was eyeing the folded cloak, but in a strangely unfocused way. "what's that do, anyway? it's kinda… blurry."
"It's an invisibility cloak," Sirius answered, his smile turning nostalgic. "My friends and I made good use of it back when we were in school."
Surprised, Warrington leaned forward for a better look. "You're serious?"
"What?" Harry tensed, worried he'd somehow given him away. "No, he's Patrick—"
He was cut off by an amused snort from his colorfully-disguised godfather, which really threw him off. Sirius was wearing his disguise, after all: if the Slytherin doesn't already know that he's actually, well, Sirius…
Serious.
Oh.
After that second of confusion, Harry gave a stumbling correction. "Er, nevermind. He's right, it's an invisibility cloak."
Based on his quirked smile, Sans was as entertained by the accidental pun as he was by the resulting misunderstanding and awkward recovery. Then he twitched his fingers slightly, as if carefully plucking at unseen strings, and his expression slanted toward openly impressed.
"Finally found something you can't puzzle out after one look?" asked Sirius, sounding smug for some reason.
"it was bound to happen eventually."
"As curious as I am about the invisibility cloak," Warrington interjected, "could we, perhaps, refocus on the fact that Potter and I will be facing a dragon in less than a week?"
"We're not fighting one, at least," said Harry, glad that the conversation had safely skipped his near slip. "We have to get past one."
With a sarcastic eye roll, Warrington deadpanned, "Oh, well in that case…"
Harry cringed, picturing himself standing across from a dragon with nothing but a wand and his school robes: it really wasn't that much of an improvement.
Crossing his arms, Sans sighed. "i still think pitting kids against huge fire-breathing lizards is a good way to get charbroiled kids, and not much else."
"What a stunning vote of confidence."
"at least it won't wanna eat you, cass." He grinned. "too sour."
Sirius nodded gravely. "It is his greatest defense."
"Thanks. Really."
"How are we supposed to deal with a dragon?" Harry burst out, finally voicing the question that had been circling in his mind since he'd first seen them in the forest. "Even if we don't have to fight one… they're still dragons!"
"relax, kid."
He bristled. "'Kid'?!"
Sans… maybe winced, it was really hard to tell. Especially since, when the first year continued speaking, he sounded just as calm as ever—a point which was somewhere between reassuring and irritating.
"what we need to do is come up with a plan." Sans stuffed his hands into the pockets of his hoodie. "and you know what they say; seven heads are better than three."
"Rattles, that's not how the saying—"
"Well, Ron's probably still awake," said Harry, having connected the seven dots faster than his godfather had, "but I don't know about Hermione. And I have no clue how to get Krum, he's out on the ship—"
"Woah, pup, we don't need to meet up tonight!"
Rocking back his chair in a way that made physics cringe, Sans lazily added, "it's way too late, people should be dead asleep at this hour."
"So you do know that," Warrington muttered.
"But…"
Sirius set a reassuring hand on his godson's shoulder. "We have three days before the first task—"
"two, depending on how you count it."
"Not helping, Rattles," Sirius not-whispered at his weird friend. With a sigh, he focused again: "Harry. And Cassius, you too. It's not a lot of time, sure, but having a few days to plan is nothing to scoff at."
"especially if you know what to plan for."
Warrington gave the two of them a weighted look. "And, again, how long have you known what the first task would be?"
"a while." Sans shrugged off the at-least-a-little-bit-betrayed expressions pointed his way. "we were planning to check that it was still dragons—tomorrow, actually—and set up a time to scheme after that."
"Bit short notice, innit?"
Sirius threw an arm around his godson's shoulders, unconcerned. "As I said, a few days will be more than enough." His grin got somewhat conspiratorial, though Harry didn't catch the joke. "I have it on good authority that things will work out."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"welp, i suppose we may as well call it here," Sans said, not answering at all. He tipped his chair forward, thunking the front legs back onto the floor. "cass, want a lift?"
"No." The reply was immediate. Warrington stood, straightening out the blanket he still had draped over his shoulders. "If it's anything like your clever solution to get me here, then I'd rather— Sans!"
The last word was a yelp, cutting off whatever he'd been about to say as he dropped into the floor. It wasn't a perfect vanishing act, however, as one corner of the comforter had gotten caught on the chair leg.
"Was that…how you got him here?"
Sirius was holding back laughter, but he managed a nod.
"express to-and-from bed," said Sans. "nobody'll suspect a thing."
The blanket twitched a few times—being tugged on from the other side—but it remained stuck. A moment later, hesitantly, a hand popped up from the ground. It patted around on the cloth for a bit, then finagled it free from the chair.
"good night, cass."
Though Warrington said nothing—or at least, they didn't hear him say anything—the hand pointed angrily in Sans's general direction: a silent telling-off.
"hey, man—if it works, it works."
With a shrug-like gesture that still managed to look dismissive and annoyed, the hand dropped back down through the floor.
"I guess I should go back to being a dog now," Sirius sighed. He took off his floppy hat with a dramatic flourish, and pale brown hair darkened to black as his features returned to normal. "But before I go…"
Sirius held out his arms, and—setting aside a small amount of embarrassment—Harry stepped into the hug. It was warm reassurance that everything would be alright. The looming threat of the first task still weighed on him, but in that moment he felt a lot better about his odds.
"Don't worry, pup," said Sirius, ruffling his hair. "We'll figure things out."
They stepped apart, and the wizard made the shift back into a golden retriever: albeit one with oversized headwear and a blue bowtie. The floppy hat was tucked away somewhere—presumably magically relocated, because there was no way Sans had pockets that deep. Then, with a wagging tail and a cheery wave goodbye, the two of them vanished into thin air.
And with that, Harry was alone in the empty classroom
But, seriously…
Dragons.
Author's Note:
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or Undertale.
Turns out dragons are pretty freakin' scary.
Okay, so, this is a month late, which really isn't the greatest start to 2021…
But whatever, onward and upward!
And I just got really good news today: I finally got a job! So things are already looking up!
Updates aim for the first of the month. Sorry for so many delays!
Thanks again for all the favorites, follows, and reviews! Sorry for worrying you guys with the delays lately, I'm still alive! This chapter was a real mess at the start of January, sorry again taht it took so long to iron things out.
Join the Discord if you're interested! Invite code: m3CFXnC
(There's a lot of cool art in there, check it out!)
[Replying to a few reviews here]
ALERT ALERT (also 'Sans a tad OOC', I assume): I can kinda see where you're coming from, because by this point Sans is certainly less… perhaps 'lethargic' would be a good word? Yeah, he's definitely different. But by this point, he's had months (not even counting void-time) without the resets rendering his every action pointless, and there's no threat of somebody he once called 'friend' massacring everyone he's ever cared about. I wouldn't say he's super proactive, at this point, but he's certainly feeling like his actions might actually have meaning again.
I suppose this may just be a difference of interpretation. I hope you can continue to enjoy the story regardless! (Also, I hadn't noticed the exclamation mark thing. I won't say I won't use them in his dialog anymore, but I'll keep that in mind!)
Somebody (I couldn't find the review again, sorry!): I have a general outline of events that I want to happen, and I have ideas for how some things will play out. Between that, however, I'm flying blind! Which, occasionally, forces me to have to reconsider my vague outline-plan because the characters chose to careen off in a random direction.
Like, I didn't originally plan for Cassius to be at the Quidditch World Cup. Then I was writing that part, and well… turns out he was present! That had a good number of ripple effects.
Stay safe, and see ya on the flipside, everyone!
