Chapter Text
Sans was uncomfortable.
A set of four cots had been transfigured for them, but the discomfort was a given. In fact, he'd argue that it would be impossible to be comfortable in his current position: faking unconsciousness with so many people still hovering and talking over his head was not exactly fun, by any metric.
And it would seem the gathered witches and wizards still had quite a bit to say.
Alas.
While he certainly had a lot of practice at pretending to sleep, it was never for a long-term con. A minute or so was really all he'd need to rile up whoever he was aiming to annoy or inconvenience—most often his brother or Undyne, both of whom were perfectly willing to escalate until they “woke” him up.
But in this case, despite the loud chatter, nobody was expecting him to rouse any time soon.
He focused on breathing, because otherwise he'd stop—no lungs, after all—and the glamour needed a bit of prompting to make the appropriate motions. In and out, up and down: easy, but he didn't usually have to make an effort. The whole breathing-optional thing was a lot less obvious when he's upright, just talking or otherwise moving around.
In and out, up and down.
Elsewhere, the school bell tolled a warning for curfew. Of course, the wizards and witches here paid it no mind and kept right on talking. Arguing, more like: when, how to transport the hostages down to the lake, into the lake, how to keep them hidden along the way, and on and on. Sans didn't really bother to follow the back-and-forth bickering bits, paying just enough attention to pick out anything he'd need to do something about.
Which… seems to be nothing, for now.
After (too much) deliberation, they landed on just two spells in the transport plan: levitating the cots to move all four hostages, plus a disillusionment charm to keep them out of sight in case the should-be-empty halls weren't empty enough. Simple. No spells that he'd need to intercept or fake his way through.
It was hard to remain limp as the cot beneath him shifted purpose to airborne gurney—he might not have actual muscles to tense up, but that instinct is not physicality-dependent, as it turns out. Eyes not firmly shut (as that would be too stiff), he followed their journey down and out with his less mundane senses.
Sans was struck, abruptly, by a sense of déjà vu. Events from the previous summer, playing out nearly in reverse now: he was one of those lifted into the air, this time, and the procession of unconscious people was being taken to a lake rather than away.
What a peculiar symmetry.
After he and the other three kidnapees were dropped off in the cold boat house—all by themselves, with just a few alarm charms to make sure they all stayed put—the rest of the night passed by in pseudo-solitary discomfort.
He allowed himself to drift towards almost-sleep, feather-light, trading just a few minutes at a time: fake sleep for something just a touch more genuine.
Eventually, at what his mental clock tracked to be an hour or so past dawn and thus nearing the promised hour-before-the-task relocation time, Sans was pulled from shallow doze to controlled stillness.
The creaky boat house door swung open again.
A splash.
Voices, a one-sided discussion.
And from there, into the water.
The contingent of merpeople who had come to take the hostages down didn't say much above water—understandable, given what their voices sound like up there—but they didn't say much underwater either.
The gurney-cot had been discarded back in the boat house, replaced by a length of what felt like kelp expertly looped around his ribcage: all of them pulled along underwater like a very strange set of balloons.
Sans did his best to float limply along behind the group, hindered in the attempt by a little fact he'd neglected to take into account when last-minute planning: his bones, though they are made of magic, are not buoyant. Which wouldn't really be a problem, if not for the fact that humans, by comparison, are. A human's floaty-ness is presumably helped along by the fact that they actually have lungs to hold air, while Sans just gets the distinctly unsettling sensation of a ribcage full of water.
Has Sans stored things inside his chest cavity before? Yes.
Can he ignore the feeling of lake water sloshing through him? Also yes.
Is it uncomfortable? Supremely so.
At least all the moving helped cover up any slips in his blue-magic readjustments, even if the current was overall very strange to experience. Water in his ribcage, water in his eye sockets, in his skull: honestly, if he can avoid it, never again.
Eventually, of course, the moving stopped. There was a bit of magical attention juggling, as he balanced his float-sink redirection with once again filling out his glamour as they adjusted the kelp rope. Once finished, the tie had been moved from around his torso to down around his ankle.
(His poor pink slippers.)
(Maybe he should've left them behind, but too late now. At least nobody seemed to notice how odd it was that they were staying on. In the merpeople's defense, they didn't have much experience with feet.)
After all the hostages were re-tied, they were once again left alone.
Mostly, at least. Even with his eye sockets shut, Sans could tell there were beings floating around nearby—well, beings other than the kinda-technically kidnapped humans suspended in the water to his left and right. The merpeople hadn't exactly left, just moved a bit farther off.
But that's beside the point, of course, because he meant 'alone' in the sense that it was just him, his fellow hostages, and the merpeople: the tournament organizers who sent them all to the watery deep had long-since been left behind on the shore. A twist of magical senses told him there wasn't any surveillance either, so—
Wait.
He double checked.
He triple checked.
“that can't—” The words just slipped out, startled out of his sleep-act, as he quadruple checked. Same result. “really?”
It's just that… Yes, the Bagman guy hadn't said anything about how they'd be keeping an eye on things down under, but Sans had assumed that he'd just forgotten to mention it. He didn't think there just wasn't anything to mention. In part because not having some way to watch what was happening would be a glaring safety flaw. In bigger part because this whole tournament was ostensibly a spectator sport.
Surely the surveillance would begin later, once the task officially began, because otherwise…
Were the crowds coming to watch the second task seriously just going to be staring at the surface of the lake for basically an hour? Maybe they can get a refund for their tickets or something.
Actually, hold on, are there tickets for the tasks?
A shift in the water brought his attention back to his immediate surroundings.
“You… breathe?”
He heard the voice in weird layers, both similar and very different to the sound that came out of the golden eggs—a depth in real life that apparently didn't translate well into the recording.
Well, caught was caught, so he went ahead and opened his actual eyes instead of just using his metaphysical ones. Though technically, all things considered, his actual eyes were pretty metaphysical too.
The merperson that had approached reminded him vaguely of Shyren—or, perhaps he should say, it reminded him of Shyren when she was leaning on her agent for moral support. Undyne might be the better comparison, if she was a bit more fishtail-y from the torso down.
This particular fish-adjacent being was a ruddy gray-green color, shading towards yellow on their—or 'her', if the tone of voice was a reliable indicator—fins and all the kelp-like strands of her hair. She was holding a long carved spear, but her grip had the weapon down and to the side: not threatening, then.
“eh, for a given value of 'breathe',” he replied, side-eyeing the mostly-still bodies of the other kidnapees. They weren't not breathing, as evidenced by the fine stream of tiny bubbles drifting up from their faces, but they weren't exactly doing the usual inhale-exhale of it all. It was weird.
With a flick of her tail, the merperson dipped down to check on the kelp rope that was ostensibly keeping him from floating up to the surface. Which it was doing, if only because he'd maintained the bit of blue magic trickery to flip gravity for himself: still had to make sure that he'd sink “up”, after all.
With more warning, he could've figured out a simpler way to fake floating—like stuffing a balloon up his ribcage or something equally effective (if uncomfortable). Still, the gravitational switch wasn't too noticeable. The main give-away was that any air still caught in his clothes were sending bubbles “up” to the bottom of the lake, at least until they drifted away from him and passed the edge of the altered directions.
While the merperson was distracted, Sans took his chance to look around a bit more closely, taking in the murky sight of an underwater town square. It didn't look that much like a human town, but the buildings did bear a blob-ish stone-gray resemblance to some he'd seen down in Waterfall. That said, there weren't doors or windows so much as there were win-doors: no purpose to keeping entrances at ground level, after all. Glimmering light peeked through some of the openings, highlighting patches of kelp and other water plants.
From what he could tell, they had been tied off at the base of a statue—his position wasn't the best to see the overall shape, but he could see that the kelp rope was wrapped around stone that looked pretty tail-like. Could be a big fish, but it was probably a rough-hewn merperson figure.
Suitably dramatic, he decided.
(Although, given the continued lack of magical surveillance, it really seemed like the crowds weren't going to get to appreciate that point.)
Apparently finding nothing amiss with the tether, she looked back to the other mer-guards for a brief but packed conversation of glances and gestures. No words, until she twisted back towards Sans.
“This is not what we were told,” she said, swimming back up to head height. “All of you were to be asleep.”
“yep. i was told that, too.” He fished for an excuse and… well, it'd worked before: “i have a skin condition.”
She tipped her head, and blurbled in a way he took to be an unspoken question.
Sans shrugged, lightly. “sometimes magic interacts with me weird.”
Mostly because he messes with it first, but nobody needs to know the specifics.
“You are… safe, regardless?” The mer-guard was fully staring at him—at his throat and mouth, specifically—and it took him a moment to realize that she'd just noticed the lack of air as he spoke.
“oh, yeah, no trouble here.” He gave an exaggerated exhale: as if blowing out a gusty sigh, save for the conspicuous lack of any accompanying bubbles. That felt so weird. “all the important magic seems to be fine, i'm just still awake.”
She considered this for a moment, then visibly decided that she didn't actually care enough to investigate more closely. The merpeople must have only agreed to watch over the students, to keep them safe, and so that assurance was all she really needed. Giving him one last look-over, she turned tail—literally—and swam back to join the rest of the water-blurred figures at the perimeter of the town square.
Well.
Alright then.
Assuming Bagman hadn't been lying before, the task would be starting in less than an hour. There wasn't much Sans could do about that.
There wasn't much Sans could do at all, period: comes with the territory of being tied up at the bottom of a lake, he supposed. Though his options were rather more numerous than expected, since he didn't need to keep up his unconsciousness act so long as it held that nobody up there was watching down here.
Still, limited.
His best bet was probably to pass along whatever information he could, and, outside of that, to simply keep an eye out.
And to that end—
It's time to place a call.
About a gallon of water slipped through before he got the shortcut calibration sorted out for under-lake audio-only contact. Not a common setup, that: tricky to let the vibrations pass through without the medium. He heard a spluttered incoherent noise of surprise, and surmised that his aim, at least, was still perfectly accurate.
And besides, he'd made sure to check that Cassius was actually alone before doing anything, so the extra water wasn't that big of an issue.
“my bad,” Sans said quietly, mindful of the merpeople around the clearing. But they didn't seem to pay him any mind: not at risk of drowning, not their problem. “didn't splash ya too bad, did i?”
“Missed me by that much,” replied Cassius, in a low mutter.
“ah, good.”
There was a plish-plish sound as he walked through the new puddle. “So. Care to explain why in Merlin's name you're tossing water at me?”
“the water was an accident. just a common hazard of making a call from”—he paused, calculated, and decided accuracy wasn't worth it—“twenty thousand leagues under the sea.”
“I know you're trying to be funny, but you do realize that the leagues in question were a distance traveled and not the depth, right?”
“you've read that book?”
“…No.”
“that wasn't very convincing.”
The sigh was audible—Cassius exhaustedly pinching the bridge of his nose was not, but somehow came through just as clearly. “I've just… heard about it. From my—” He cut himself off with another huff. “Nevermind that, we're getting off track. I assume, based on the water, that you've somehow gotten yourself involved in the second task more personally than you planned.”
“yep. got snatched.” Somewhat apologetically, Sans continued, “we knew it'd actually be someone taken, rather than something. but there was no point in you all stressing out about it, so i figured i'd wait to tell ya. and then—well.”
“And then you got taken. Alright.” There was a long, heavy pause—shifting priority, reassessing—before he repeated, “Alright. So. Who else?”
“hermione, ron, and a little girl i don't recognize,” Sans rattled off, with a side glance at their floating bodies.
Another pause as Cassius chewed through that information. “…Interesting group. Hermione must've been taken for Viktor, after the Yule Ball. Ron for Harry, of course.” A sigh. “Rotten luck, that, since that's basically his entire friend group.”
Sans hummed in agreement, quietly noting that Cassius didn't seem overly surprised by who had been picked for his hostage. He wasn't arguing against it, at least, which felt kind of significant.
“And that leaves the girl for Fleur.”
“she look's like a mini-fleur, so probably.”
“Anything else you'd like to share?”
“good question.” Slowly looking around again, Sans considered. “we seem to be at the mer-town, or whatever its name is. not sure how useful that is to know—not like you can just plug it into your gps.”
Destination: Mer-ville, avoid highways and toll roads.
“My what?”
“doesn't matter.”
Instead of a reply, Sans heard the sound of a door opening and a pause to check the coast was clear. Then footsteps resumed—the contact would need to be cut soon enough, as Cassius headed up to more populated regions of the castle. After all, there's less than an hour before the task by now, and that means soon everyone will be heading out to the lakeshore en masse.
“And are you planning to inform anyone else, or will I be passing on the news?”
“i could call harry, i suppose…”
“…But?”
“eh, i figure you can handle it. more straightforward.”
“Of course.” Sans could hear the eye-roll in his tone. Cassius asked, “Will you be doing anything during the task, then?”
Tipping his head in a so-so gesture was pointless—only sound was carried through this shortcut, after all. But it was habit, and, as it turns out, that sucked. Just like when he was being dragged to this place, the quick motion had water slooshing around in his skull in a thoroughly distracting manner. “ugh, water.”
“…Sans?”
“sorry, yeah, i heard ya.” He resisted the urge to shake his head again: no fast moves underwater, if possible. “i'll be keeping a lookout, but hopefully i won't have to do anything.”
“Hopefully,” Cassius echoed, in full agreement. Understandably, given what had prompted intervention during the last task—nobody wants a repeat.
“anything you need me to do, before i let ya go?”
“No.” Then, snarkily: “Unless you can turn back the clock to keep this whole tournament from ever happening in the first place?”
Sans couldn't help but grimace. “can't, thankfully. and i prefer my clocks clockwise over counterclockwise, anyways.”
The silence on Cassius's end spoke to the annoyed expression that was surely on his face. “…Why do I have the feeling that wasn't just a throwaway joke, Sans?”
“i'd never throw away a perfectly good joke.”
“Sure, sure.” He huffed. “Now seriously, I'd rather not appear positively mad, walking the halls talking to myself.”
Cassius was nearing the point where the quiet halls outside the Slytherin dormitory were replaced by the bustle of the arterial routes through the castle, so it was probably about time to cut the conversation off.
“fair enough. good luck!”
And he dropped the shortcut. The twisted space straightened back out with nary a ripple on his side, but Sans went ahead and splashed a bit more water though just to make it clear the connection was shut.
“Merlin's b—”