Chapter 23: Time-Stop

The energy for the spell had built in what felt like an instant, giving Sans barely any time to react. But then again, barely any time was more than enough.

In that instant, with a sharp and draining swirl of his magic, he froze the witch and her spell in place.

And to do so, darkening the quaint cottage yard around him, Sans froze everything else as well.

It was painfully exhausting. Stopping time always was—like finding a crack in his SOUL, forcing it wide open, and holding it there. To make things worse, he would be feeling the effects for nearly a full week. Nothing major, really, but aches and pains were always annoying to deal with.

He'd done it before, though. And he'd do it again.

There was a faint glow at the tip of the strange witch's wand, glowing a faint greenish color where the spell was mostly formed. But that faint green was not for healing, he could tell; then his sense of it blurred, and it was hard to recall what it felt like as soon as he withdrew his magic.

So Sans stared at it, unsure what exactly he should do.

Everyone was still frozen in place—himself included, since moving in a time-stop put even more strain on his magic. The witch had jabbed her wand squarely at Mr. Roberts, right at the bridge of his nose, but Sans was pretty sure the spell would reach out toward the rest of the family as well. And with an incantation like 'Obliviate', so obviously similar to 'oblivion'… well, Sans didn't want that spell near any of their heads.

On that thought, he turned his considerable focus on the spell, not letting himself be distracted by the frozen family or the tearing ache in his SOUL from keeping time itself still. Carefully brushing his magic against that of whatever the witch had been trying to do, Sans did not like what he was feeling. He didn't know what he was feeling, exactly—not from such a basic observation—but he knew he didn't like it.

So, for the first time in who knows how long, he cast a full CHECK. Sure, it was on a spell and not a person, but with precise enough control the difference doesn't matter. The information wrote itself into his mind.

* Obliviate — ATK 0
* A spell that erases memories.

For an instant, the horror—and, in no small part, the anger—almost distracted him enough to lose his grip on time. There was no hesitation when he jabbed a knife of magic into the spell and yanked it away from its intended effect. Time slipped forward by a millisecond because of his split focus, but it was worth it.

He would never—never!—let something like that happen.

His memories might hurt—every remembered voice or face only reminding him of what he had lost—but they were his. For so long, memories were all that he had to live with. He hadn't had a future. With resets turning back time, every present that he ever lived through would ultimately cease to exist outside his own recollections.

To think that wizards had a spell that could possibly take that away from him… He shuddered.

Though, having nullified the memory curse to do absolutely nothing, now he had to figure out what to do about the witch. She was sure to notice if the magic had no effect, and then simply cast the spell again.

Unacceptable.

He needed a different plan.

Taking a page from Sirius's book on planning, Sans went with a plan that would likely give the entire pureblooded wizarding community conniptions if they ever found out.

With a wince from SOUL-deep stress and a push of magic, the patch of space not caught frozen in time expanded across the picnic blanket, now encompassing the entire Roberts family. Mr. Roberts, who had begun the motion of jerking back from the witch before time stopped, toppled over to the side and knocked over his teacup. Distracted by his fall, both parents didn't immediately notice their odd (to say the least) circumstances.

Miles and Will, however, blinked past their confusion right away and peered about themselves in open amazement.

"What's going on?" asked Will, voice shaking ever so slightly.

"Why's it so dark all of the sudden?" Miles put a protective arm around his little brother, wrapping the younger boy in a comforting half-hug, but he sounded just a little scared too.

Gathering himself up, Mr. Roberts finally noticed that something was seriously amiss. "What in the blazes—"

"right, so— uhm, sorry." At his voice, the entire Roberts family turned to look at him. Sheepish, he ran a hand through the white hair of his disguise. "bet this is a bit… sudden."

Mrs. Roberts was staring at the witch—still paused with her spell cast halfway—and said pointedly, "I'm quite sure that 'sudden' is not the right word."

Her wording, which echoed what Sirius had said earlier, startled a laugh out of Sans.

With more insistence, Will repeated, "What's going on?"

"Yes," Mr. Roberts seconded, with similar noises of assent from the rest of the family. The man, like his wife, had focused on the frozen witch. "What is going on?"

And so Sans told them. Wizards, magic, memories… Well, he told them what he knew. It was hard to sum up the entirety of his knowledge on wizarding society, but he was a pro at simplifying needlessly complex things: he did consider himself something of a scientist, after all, and advanced SOUL theory isn't known for its simplicity.

"Alright," said Will, the first to pull himself out of blatant shock at the summary explanation provided. "So, wizards. They're real. And they actually wear pointy hats?"

Sans nodded.

"Wicked," Miles breathed.

Mrs. Roberts, who still looked a little lost, pressed one hand to her chest to help calm down and focus. After a few deep breaths, she visibly gathered herself. "Why would they keep themselves secret?"

"dunno." Sans shook his head, unsure himself. "i think it's kinda silly, tibia—" He paused, realizing that the pun would make no sense since he didn't look like a skeleton at the moment.

On the topic of secrecy, the excitement dampened somewhat and Miles risked a glance at the still temporally frozen witch. "Was… was she really going to wipe some stuff from our brains?"

With a scowl, Sans nodded. "i've changed it—the spell, i mean—but she'll notice if nothing happens."

Suddenly realizing something, Mr. Roberts jolted upright. "Am I right in… in guessing that…" He had to take a deep breath and close his eyes, and there was a simmering anger in them when they reopened. "They were going to wipe our memory purely because of that offhand comment about the fireworks?"

Miles blinked, then seemed to shrink in on himself. "'Like magic', I said. I-I'm sorry, I didn't—"

"You did nothing wrong," Mrs. Roberts cut in, and if looks could kill that witch wouldn't even have a chance at regret for targeting that mom's little boys.

"Yeah! I can't believe wizards are such arse— uh, jerks!" Will exclaimed, though his momentum was a bit staggered when he veered away from the swear; Mrs. Roberts shot her husband a scolding look while the man did his best to look perfectly innocent.

Sans nodded in agreement, not minding the almost foul language since, given this situation, he could understand the impulse. "i have no clue what their problem is, but i refuse to let something like that happen. not when i can stop it."

"Thanks," Miles said, and, though his expression still held some misplaced guilt, he smiled.

"Okay, so, now that that's settled—" Will took it upon himself to steer the conversation somewhere less scary-depressing. "Next question: why is nothing moving other than us?"

"trade secret," replied Sans with a wink.

Mr. Roberts, looking down at the picnic blanket, all at once grew very still. He got a look on his face like he wasn't quite sure he actually wanted answers but was going to ask anyway. "By 'trade secret'… do you perhaps mean 'stopping time'?"

Everyone followed the father's gaze, and so everyone realized all at once that the teacup he had knocked over earlier had never actually toppled. The cup was barely off of its saucer, but it was undeniably suspended in the air with most of the tea sloshed over the brim. It was frozen in place.

"…maybe."

"So then she—" Mr. Roberts gestured to the witch, "—shouldn't have any idea that you told us all of this, aye?"

Sans nodded.

The older man thought on that for a moment, then said, "Good. We just pretend her spell worked, then be careful not to say anything that will make them come back."

There was just one problem with that plan, that being that none of them had any idea what sort of effect they should imitate. All Sans knew was that the spell wiped memories; he didn't know if the victim would be dazed or fine or nauseous or what. The five of them sat about for what felt, to them, to be several minutes—though of course time wasn't actually moving at all.

Finally Mrs. Roberts set a hand on her husband's shoulder, startling him from his contemplation. She said simply, "It's no use sitting around thinking about it. We'll just have to give it our best shot, dear."

"true 'nuff," Sans said with a sigh. "it's not like we'll figure it out by over-thinking it anyway."

"I say we pretend to pass out!" Will said, raising a hand as if he was answering a question in class.

Miles rolled his eyes. "That's stup— er," he glanced at his mother and corrected, "silly, Will. We should just pretend like she smacked us or something."

"Let's go with a vacant sort of confusion," Mr. Roberts spoke up. "I dare say we'll be able to pull that off nicely after all these revelations!"

And so it was decided.

Helping everyone get back to wherever they had been before his time-stop was a little tricky—if they were too far off, it's possible the witch would notice. But Sans wasn't too worried, since people can be surprisingly oblivious sometimes. Especially if they weren't paying close attention.

Sans raised one hand, three fingers pointing up, telegraphing the moment he would resume time so that everyone would be prepared.

"Wait!"

He paused, hand still in the air. Will was bright red, more embarrassed than he'd looked in the past few hours they'd been playing around—even more so than when he'd tripped over nothing and stumbled around trying to regain his balance. Sans just curiously cocked his head, waiting for him to continue.

"Er, okay, since I won't be able to ask this later…" The boy took a deep breath, then gestured to himself and the rest of his family. "We're not magical."

Sans nodded, one eyebrow raised in curiosity.

Fiddling briefly with the bottom of his shirt, Will finally gathered enough courage to ask, "But… but we're still friends, right?"

"well yeah. assumin' ya wanna be," answered Sans, almost without thinking. A moment later he noticed that the question had brought a unbidden smile to his face.

Will smiled back, and even Miles looked a little relieved. It was plain to see that these two boys hadn't really had that many friends before, though Sans personally had no clue why. They were nice kids.

"Right," Miles fake-coughed, trying to cover up his own embarrassment (and relief) at this whole friendship conversation. "Let's do this."

Sans obliged, resuming the countdown with his hand.

Three fingers.

Two.

One.

And with that, he let time go.

=X=X=X=

He still kinda wanted to punch her, to be honest.

In fact, even as he felt time resume around them, he wondered if maybe he should.

Or rather, if he should have.

Hitting the witch smack on the schnoz right now wouldn't be a great plan. Sure, it might make him feel a little better, but one of the major points about time not being stopped meant that actions had consequences.

It wouldn't be worth it now, given the risk to the Roberts' memories.

The energy of the now defunct spell washed over the family and, with a prompting poke of blue magic, they all proceeded to put on their best imitation of a confused, memoryless expression. Will even did his best to go cross-eyed.

It was probably lucky that the witch didn't even seem to spare them another moment's thought.

Lucky, yes: but the disregard still made Sans seethe.

"You there," she said, calling for his attention with an annoyingly carefree tone.

Sans tried his best to appear as if he hadn't just been fantasizing punching her in the face with all the force his skinny little arms could supply. Not trusting his voice—he doubted he could keep his tone civil—the disguised skeleton simply nodded in acknowledgment.

"Uh… You are a wizard, yes?"

Technically no, but Sans was boss at dodging questions. He took a breath, letting the anger leak away as he exhaled, and then answered, "didn't you see me come over from the campsite?"

The woman blinked at him twice, clearly not recognizing that he had indeed walked here from the currently magic-occupied camp grounds, then nodded. "Of course," she said, with much more confidence than she actually felt.

"then that's that." Sans smiled, and it was all teeth. "shouldn't you leave now?"

"Ah, well, I suppose so," she said, glancing over to where the family was still doing their darnedest to look disoriented. And frowned, ever so slightly.

Not a good sign.

"then leave," Sans cut in, the angry bite in his tone snapping her attention back from whatever she may have noticed.

With a shaky nod—she actually looked a little scared, but he couldn't get himself to care all that much—the witch turned on her heel and vanished in a snap.

Which, really… the whole thing had gone quite a bit better than expected.

"So is sh—" Will cut himself off mid-question, realizing that saying something suggestive of them having memories that they shouldn't really wasn't a great idea.

Sans just shrugged.

"Quickly— Act natural!" Miles exclaimed, before immediately throwing caution (and that advice) to the wind as he took off at top speed with one last yell aimed at his brother and new friend. "You cops can't catch me now, I have the advantage!"

Although, given they had been playing tag before, perhaps this was how they could 'act natural'.

Nearly choking on a swallowed laugh, Sans ended up spluttering into a coughing fit; it would seem the eldest brother had recovered somewhat from his earlier unnecessary self-condemnation. At least he wasn't alone in his good humor, as it had startled a chuckle from both parents as well.

Will, however, didn't miss a beat; he scrambled to his feet to commence the chase with admirable speed. "A headstart? That just means you need to run longer!"

"welp, duty calls." Patting down his jacket and shorts to dislodge any dirt or grass or leaves, Sans turned to the parents with a smile. "stuff to do, friends to chase."

And then he was off.

Sans played with the two boys just a little while longer, running around more than he probably had in the entire rest of his life. Granted, he stuck around partly to make sure that the magical people in charge of cursing away memories didn't have any second thoughts… though mostly because he was genuinely enjoying himself. It might just have been the thorough distraction of chasing and being chased, but Sans was able to briefly have fun for the sake of having fun.

It was nice.

He had promised to write them occasionally, though he'd need to investigate whether he could send them mail by owl without calling the Ministry down on their heads. Maybe he should just play it safe and deliver any packages himself: he knew a great shortcut, after all.

It was several hours before Sans finally said goodbye, and when he got back to the tent it turned out that everyone else had gone off somewhere. He didn't know why they were all away—he didn't think the game had started yet—but, given how tired he felt, he appreciated the lack of people. Exhausted, really: playing around had been fun, sure, but there had been a lot of running.

So really, it would be a shame to not take advantage of the peace and quiet.

=X=X=X=

Sans slept through the entire game, and, in hindsight, Sirius wasn't sure why he'd expected anything different.

Not that either of them could have gone to actually watch the game in the first place, given they had no tickets, but that was beside the point.

Pushing past the flap hanging in the single doorway, those who actually had tickets came back to find Sirius reading through a muggle comic book and Sans curled up in a nest of blankets: they had no clue where those things had come from. They certainly hadn't been in the tent when everyone else had left to watch the game.

"No need to worry about waking him," Sirius said, not even bothering to lower his voice. "Pretty sure he could sleep through an avalanche without so much as twitching."

Ron, who was already quite good at remaining completely asleep even as other boys in his dorm got ready in the morning, looked vaguely jealous.

All those who had gotten to watch the game gathered up at the table, pulling over chairs as necessary, to discuss any particularly interesting plays they'd seen. This, naturally, made Sirius quite jealous; he was a Quidditch fan, after all, and it rankled that he hadn't been able to watch.

He flipped a page of his comic, trying his best to ignore their verbal replays of what had supposedly been a phenomenal Wronski Feint. But, of course, ignoring people very nearly went against his entire being, so he was soon joining in with his own thoughts. Even though he hadn't actually watched the game at all.

When Ginny nearly spilled hot chocolate everywhere falling asleep at the table—Sirius happened to notice and caught her just in time—everyone decided that it was time to call it a night.

Sans, naturally, didn't stir at all as everyone changed into pajamas and got into bed. He didn't even notice when he was nearly squished after Sirius conjured up a mattress and some sheets without double checking distances.

There were still sounds of singing and celebration from the other side of the camp, but, after such a long day of excitement, Sirius only needed to close his eyes to relax into a comfortable sleep.

And then, quite suddenly, he realized something was wrong.

There was shouting, but not the happy celebration from before.

Screams.

Sirius sat bolt upright, looking around the darkened tent in confusion. It didn't help that his overly-large floppy hat was still stuck on his head, courtesy of a Sticking Charm; it wouldn't do for his disguise to fail because the hat fell off as he slept. He could hear somebody—Arthur?—trying to wake up all the snoozing kids. Though given that it was clearly still dark out he hadn't the faintest idea why—

Oh sweet Merlin.

"Sans!" he yelled, scrambling immediately to try and rouse his friend. "Wake up, man!"

"wha…"

Harry and Ron—the former looking sleepy but mostly awake while it was a mystery how the latter was even upright—stumbled over. "Mr. Weasley says…" A yawn broke into his sentence. "We need to hurry… no time, get outside…"

Deciding there was only one option with a chance to wake Sans, Sirius grabbed him by the shoulder and hauled him bodily to his feet.

"woah! woah—i'm up!" Sans lurched around for a moment, trying to find his footing after being so suddenly pulled into the waking world. "…apparently literally."

All of them were hurriedly rushed out of the tent and into chaos.

It was dark and people were running, which everyone should know is a bad combination. In the light of what few campfires were still lit, Sirius could see witches and wizards fleeing into the forest. It was happening. The attack was actually happening.

To be honest, a part of him hadn't thought it would. Things were different from the first time, after all.

He had no idea what to do.

Wait, no: he had to make sure Harry stayed safe.

A plan that encountered an immediate problem, since both Harry and Ron had moved beyond his range of protection to meet up with Hermione and the rest of the Weasley crew.

"Harry!" he called out. "We need to—" The words were stopped in his throat by a bright flash of green light. For an instant, the sudden brightness seemed to flicker the whole world into darkness.

Sirius knew that color, that exact painful shade of green.

He could see them now; people in hooded black cloaks, faces hidden behind white masks. Cruel laughter rang across the entire camp, mixing eerily with shouts and screams. They were marching across the field, some firing vile colored spells indiscriminately into the camp. Most, however, held their wands aloft. Above them, suspended and being twisted into painful contortions, was what looked like a family of four.

And floating there in the air was a rapidly fading trail of green. It had been forced into a perfect right angle, mere inches before it would have hit one of the smaller figures.

Inches before it would have killed a child.

Beside him, Sans stood with one hand outstretched. Where he should have had eyes, there was only blackness.

He was still smiling, but it was a dark thing. Empty.

Cold.

Then, with a chime and a crackle of magic that sounded nearly like music, his left eye filled with blue and gold flames.

Author's Note:

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or Undertale.

Yes indeed, another cliffhanger. And this one's even worse than before!

The idea for Sans being able to stop time is from that scene at Grillby's when he asks Frisk if they've heard of a talking flower. He says that he wants to ask them something, then everything outside their little bubble stops moving and they chat. After the lights come back and things start moving again, he even says that he forgot what he wanted to say.
To me, that sounds like he's covering for having stopped time. Take that headcanon as you will.

By the way, reading between the lines, it really does sound like the Death Eaters killed one of the Roberts family. There is mention of a strong green light, and a few paragraphs later they notice that one of the children is limp. Given the attackers want to torture and humiliate—and yes, ultimately kill—this family, I doubt they would let a child escape into unconsciousness.
And later, when Mr. Weasley mentions so nonchalantly that "that was a big thing they had to make him forget"… well.
There's nothing concrete, of course, so maybe I'm just seeing things that aren't there. But I think that paints a rather dark picture for what had been done to that poor family.

In happier news: HOLY CRAP! This story has passed 100,000 total views!
Thank you so much for all the great reviews and favorites and follows and… just, thanks. You guys are amazing!

See ya on the flipside, everyone!