Chapter 51: Not Technically Extracurricular

It was strangely unnerving to be in the classroom all alone. Not so much the fact that the room was empty—his practice room was just an old unused classroom, after all—but rather that the room was one he had become used to seeing full.

He took his usual seat, and took a minute to concentrate on regulating his magic. Every little bit of focus would help.

Beyond that, he'd just have to wait and see how things go.

The door at the other end of the room swung open, and Professor McGonagall stepped through. She was carrying a small stack of papers, which she set on the desk in front of him: curiously, they all seemed to be blank.

"Hello, Mr. Skelton," she greeted.

Sans grinned back, and pretended that everything would go well.

The first few minutes actually did, though it was all fairly standard lesson stuff; the professor just went over what she expected of him during these sessions, and gave him some general information about how everything would work.

Simple.

Then, of course, she moved on to the actual lesson.

"Tell me, Mr. Skelton, what do you feel when you cast a spell?"

So. It begins.

Sans considered the question for a moment, comparing the sensation of his own magical methods to the incantations and wand motions favored by wizardkind: they were similar, but at the same time quite different.

"do you mean, like, emotion stuff or actual physical stuff?" he asked, trying to buy some time to think.

"Either."

"…okay."

Since he doubted that wizards had a similar awareness of their magic as he had for his own, answering could be a bit tricky. But at the same time, Sans really had nothing to base a reply on other than his own experiences.

So, after taking a moment to think things through: "it's like color."

"Color?"

"yep." At least she didn't seem to be too surprised or confused by that comparison. "like, one spell might have a lot of blue in it, and another has a bunch of yellow. or whatever."

Professor McGonagall said nothing for a moment, thoughtful—which was either a good sign, or a very bad one—and then asked, "When you perform a spell, do you picture these colors?"

"uh, yeah."

Maybe he shouldn't have said that. From what he could tell, most other students just wave their wands and say the magic words: there hadn't been any mention of color-sound awareness in any of his classes.

"Interesting." The professor pointed her wand at one of the pieces of paper on the desk, and it curled—changed—into a solid metal ingot. "We shall start by practicing 'Wingardium Leviosa'."

Well, at least that's a little lucky. Maybe.

Most of his practice time had been spent on that spell, after all, even though it hadn't actually been taught in class yet. The fact that it used mostly blue magic—his best color, by far—meant he had a bit more control of the particulars. Plus, with levitation, it was fairly easy to track improvement.

If the desk slams into the ceiling on the first attempt, and on the third it's only a tap, then plainly things have gotten better. With some of the other charms… well, it's a bit harder to tell if one 'Lumos' is less blinding than the next.

He held his bone wand in an easy grip, trying to stay relaxed in the hope that doing so would keep the spell from pwing-ing out of control like a released rubber band.

Things hadn't gone too badly during his last few practices.

This should be easy enough, right?

Approximately two seconds later, with the ingot now somehow wedged firmly in the ceiling, Sans had to acknowledge the bothersome truth: no, it was not going to be that easy.

With the professor right there, he had no way to avoid saying the incantation or doing the wand gesture. And both of those added to the spell further, building onto his intent, saturating colors, until… well, the outcome spoke for itself.

"Try again," Professor McGonagall directed, transfiguring a second metal bar.

Hiding a grimace, Sans complied. He swish-flicked his wand, and, with the least energy he could manage without making it obvious, stated, "wingardium leviosa."

Again, instead of the gentle ascent the spell should have caused, the manner with which the ingot lifted into the air had more in common with a railgun.

At least this time it didn't lodge itself in the ceiling. Though that was probably only because, with a loud bang, it hit the first still-stuck ingot and fell right back down. Sans had to quickly dodge to make sure it missed his skull, and the bar landed back on his desk with a clanging thud.

Perhaps he was more anxious about this whole thing than he had first thought.

Which, in the context of the other dangerous and certainly more high-risk secret-keeping stunts he'd pulled off in the past, was a little bit baffling. But then again, one should never underestimate the jitter-inducing power of a stern school teacher.

(And the wonderful—if sometimes daunting—fact that here, there were no do-overs.)

"in my defense," he said, with a totally indifferent shrug, "that's the first time in a while it's messed up so badly."

Professor McGonagall, who had been staring at the jammed metal with a look best described as 'resigned disbelief', glanced back down at him. "'In a while', you say? Then I assume you've been practicing outside of class."

Perhaps he should have phrased that differently. "uhm… yeah. for charms, anyway." After a quick pause, he asked, "that's not illegal or something, is it?"

"No, technically not."

"i hear a 'but'."

"But," she did add, with a hint of amusement, "while practicing outside of class is usually permitted, having seen the… effect your spells have had, I must admit to some concern."

Fair enough.

"Overloading a spell can be dangerous." The professor picked up the ingot, frowning slightly at the dent it had left in the desk. "From what I have seen, you always use more power than is needed."

"well, i blame the wand," Sans quipped. It was the honest truth of the matter, though he tried to keep his tone light and joking.

Even so, Professor McGonagall paused. Setting aside the metal bar, tone curious, she asked, "Do you really?"

Uh-oh, he did not like where this seemed to be headed: that quip hadn't been worth it.

"i was kidding."

"I have noticed that yours appears to be quite… unique." She glanced from her own wand to his, thoughtful—not a good sign. "Is it beech?"

"going off its attitude alone, maybe it is."

Professor McGonagall gave him a stern look for the sideways swear, but simply continued with what she had been saying. "Unfortunately, I am not familiar with the particulars of wandlore. If there truly is something wrong with your wand, you would need to ask a master wandmaker." Her expression became calculating. "Perhaps…"

"'perhaps' what?" asked Sans, understandably worried about that tone.

"Something for me to consider later, that's all." She said nothing for a moment, looking him over with a critical eye. "When magical society was first transitioning to wands, many witches and wizards found wands cumbersome to use."

Not fully trusting this new direction the conversation had taken, he just shrugged. "what's that got to do with this?"

"There are theories," the professor continued, voice taking on the practiced cadence of a lecture, "that this difficultly was because they were already accustomed to using their magic without tools."

Okay, that's getting worryingly close to some truths.

"and you think that might be what's up?" Acting skeptical, Sans gestured broadly at the classroom walls, as if to encompass all of magical society. "i mean, c'mon. i've only known this whole world even existed for, what?—maybe a few months?"

Though that statement didn't accurately count the period he'd spent in the void, after meeting Sirius: which, technically, was when he first learned about this reality. But given that time was kind of a loose, non-existent concept out there… close enough.

"All young witches and wizards experience some degree of accidental magic, Mr. Skelton, regardless of their knowledge of the magical community." Professor McGonagall folded her hands together, regarding him as if he were an intriguing puzzle. "It's not particularly unusual to find students who have figured out how to make it… less accidental."

"oh."

That was good to know.

Not that he planned on revealing his 'wandless' magic any time soon; it's always useful to have some back-up cards.

"No matter the reason," the professor added, with a nod to the ingot, "the best thing to do for now, is to practice."

He twisted his wand in his grip, and sighed.

"welp. here goes nothing."

=X=X=X=

Stepping into the hallway nearly an hour later, after adding countless new dents to the ceiling and the desk, Sans took a deep breath.

"coulda gone better, coulda gone worse," he murmured to himself, glancing back at the classroom door. "we'll have to see how things go from here."

But that's a problem for the future. Right now, he had to get to a meeting.

After glancing around to make sure the coast was clear, Sans reached out through the castle with his more magical senses.

The only people in the designated scheming classroom were already in the know about his whole teleporting business. There was Cassius, his faded-but-strengthening green SOUL sitting beside the window, while the purple-edged orange heart of one Sirius Black was over by the blackboard.

He chuckled to himself—blackboard—and made a mental note to figure out a pun for that at some point.

With a little bit of magic, he prepared to make the short jump over to them. And in the process, noticed something else he found fairly amusing.

"so, tell me," Sans said, as he stepped through his shortcut. He looked between the two of them, grinning. "did you guys actually talk at all while you waited, or were you both just sitting in this room silently staring at each other?"

Closing the book he had been skimming through, Cassius greeted, "Hello, Sans."

"i'll take that to mean the latter."

The Slytherin didn't roll his eyes, but he did give him a flat, unimpressed look.

Tail wagging, Sirius snorted.

"that's a good point, paddy-paws. if we keep needing to hang out like this, maybe we should just make a club." Sans nodded to himself, as if he were completely serious about the idea. "it could be the mystery club, 'cept the mystery is whatever it is we're supposed to do."

"Or perhaps," Cassius countered, "the mystery is the two of you."

The disguised skeleton shared an amused look with the wizard-turned-dog, and had to nod in agreement.

"well, anyway…" Righting one of the many tipped-over chairs, Sans settled in. "what's up?"

A bark informed him that Sirius, for one, had no idea.

"As I told you earlier, I have some new questions." Cassius shifted slightly, hesitating as he tried to put words in order. "I'd like to know what you did to my…" Another pause, and he finished, "My soul."

"…what?"

"In Defense class, yesterday." Clearly still unsettled by whatever had happened, Cassius went on, "Professor Moody… He put everybody under the Imperius Curse, one after the other." He swallowed drily. "When he got to me, it… I panicked, but it didn't… The curse didn't pull me under, I don't know—"

"okay, i think i can get the gist of it," Sans said, cutting in with a raised hand. "and you think it has something to do with your SOUL?"

Before Cassius could reply, there was a loud bark from the currently-canine wizard. Sirius stood, shook, and trotted over to place a paw on the side of his seat.

"hold that thought, cass." Sans raised a brow at his canine friend. "you sure?"

The dog nodded, and gave a small woof.

"if ya say so." Reaching a hand into nothing, Sans pulled out a certain colorful hat. "should be safe enough here."

Well, give him a minute and he'd make it safe enough.

Blue magic glimmered along the baseboard, slipping up the floor, ceiling, and walls. Plus just a touch of orange, softened with yellow, to subtly encourage any passerby to keep moving—nothing that would hurt, but it would work to nudge most people along. It was a familiar set-up, though he left off the tell-tale flames he'd had flickering under his bedroom door in the Underground.

With that, the classroom was basically inaccessible.

Is he being a bit overly paranoid? Maybe.

But better safe than sorry.

As soon as he finished with that, he dropped the hat over the dog's snoot. Sirius shifted a little under the brim, then shifted a lot as he changed into his alter-alter-ego.

"Ah, the wonders of being human!" With the colorful disguise of Patrick Pawdy settled over his shoulders, Sirius worked through a few stretches. "Don't get me wrong, being a dog is great and all," he remarked, "but having hands is just so useful."

Cassius glanced to the walls, where there was still a faint shimmer of blue. "Are you sure this is safe?"

"Oh, probably," answered Sirius, as he pulled up a chair and sat down. "Rattles has plenty of tricks up his baggy sleeves, after all. I'm sure it's fine."

"anyway," Sans began, bringing the conversation back around. "you said that the imperius-control-y spell didn't work on you, cass?"

The Slytherin blinked at their cavalier attitude, but let it pass. "Yes. When it tried to pull me under, I just… refused."

"hmm…" He thought back to that night in the campground. Considering what he had done to break the Imperius strings, Sans was pretty sure he knew what had happened. "this'll take some explaining."

Sirius snorted. "It always does."

"that's life for ya," said Sans, with a cheerful shrug. He waved the blackboard over to his side of the room. "alright then. you know about your SOUL, yeah?"

"Do I know about it?" Cassius repeated as a question, sounding exasperated. "I mean, I know it apparently exists, and not much else."

"Same here," Sirius chimed in.

"that's fair." A bit of blue magic snatched up a piece of chalk. "i'll just give you a quick rundown, because we'll start cutting into prime sleep time if this goes too long."

"Of course we will."

As Sans drew a few hearts on the blackboard, he asked, "hey, pat, can you hook me up with some rainbow?"

"Sure thing, Rattles."

It only took a flick of the wizard's wand to fill the outlines: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple. Which technically didn't cover all of the colors of the SOUL spectrum—missing cyan, for one thing—but it would be close enough for a brief overview.

"say these are SOULs," Sans began. "and each color is a different trait, like green for kindness and blue for integrity. you follow?"

They both nodded.

"most people have one main trait, and that's what color your SOUL has." Seeing the puzzled look on Sirius's face, he added, "but you can pick up other ones, if you get some character development."

"You make me sound like I'm in a book or something," he pouted.

"who can say?" Sans waved the point away. "but anyway, even though a SOUL might look like one color, everybody's got a bit of each in there."

The many-hued wizard nodded, and sat back in his chair.

Sans held up a hand and nonchalantly summoned a long bone, which he then used as a pointer. "cass, you've got a green SOUL." He tapped the corresponding heart on the blackboard. "but that doesn't mean you don't have integrity—" a tap on the blue heart, then the orange one, "—or that you're not brave."

"Where are you going with this?" Cassius kept his tone level, surprisingly. "That in order to break the Imperius, you changed my soul?"

"well, yes and no."

"…What do you mean?"

"do you really think it'd be that easy to change somebody?" Sans asked, tone both curious and amused. "gonna take a smidge more than that, i tell ya."

The Slytherin gave him a flat look, silently demanding a better answer.

Sans tilted his head to one side, searching for the right words. "i just… used a bit of red to cut the strings." Another pause, reconsidering. "so i suppose i did technically add some red," he said, after that long moment.

"Red?" Frowning at the board, Cassius asked, "What trait does red represent?"

"red is determination."

"And what, exactly," he stressed, "does 'adding more red' mean?"

"it means what it means."

"That's not particularly helpful."

"i'd say it is," said Sans, one brow raised. "i gave you some more red—and that means more determination. willpower. whatever ya wanna call it." He shrugged. "but i didn't do it on purpose, really. my guess is that it stuck with you because you used to have red, so there was space for it to stay."

Actually changing the colors of a SOUL took some heavy-duty machinery: something like the DT extractor, for example. Although, given how Cassius had been drained of his own determination, it would seem that the Imperius Curse could do something similar.

No wonder it was classified as an Unforgivable.

"But if you only restored what I used to have…" Cassius carded a hand through his hair, needing a moment to put his thoughts in order. "How was I able to resist it now? Before you… added in red, or whatever you did, my parents…" He took a deep breath. "I mean, that never happened before. The Imperius Curse had always—"

"Wait a minute, stop," Sirius cut in abruptly, voice low and shaded with anger, "You've been put under the Imperius multiple times? By your own parents?"

"I—" Turning away, Cassius shook his head. "It doesn't matter."

But Sans still caught a glimpse of his expression—resentment pointed both inward and out, fear, and too much pride to say anything more.

"that's a 'yes'," he said, somewhat grimly.

"Okay." Sirius nodded. "Have any ideas, Rattles?"

"not yet, pat."

Eyes narrowed in what was probably confused suspicion, Cassius looked between the two of them. "Ideas for what?"

"Revenge, obviously."

"Revenge?"

"for you."

"For—" Cassius stopped, pinched the bridge of his nose, and sighed. "Whatever so-called logic you two follow will forever escape me." Then his expression darkened. "Besides, it's better for…" he hesitated, and firmly finished, "Best that they don't know anything is different. It's safer."

"…alright," Sans said. "we'll hold off on the revenge planning."

"For now, anyway."

With a slight frown, Cassius shook his head, "Why plan at all?"

Shrugging, his colorful hat flopping with the motion, Sirius simply stated, "Hey, you might be a Slytherin, but from what I've seen you're not half bad."

"not even a quarter bad."

"And nobody deserves that." His expression became distant, as if he were looking somewhere else—or perhaps somewhen. Sirius smiled, a little sad. "It took me a while, but I've figured out that much at least."

Sans may not know his friend's full life story, but he knew quite a bit. And he could infer even more from the simple fact that Grimmauld Place—the Black family home—was packed with dark artifacts.

"so no plans for revenge, huh?" Kicking back in his chair, Sans put his slippered feet up on a desk. "i take it you got some kinda stay-undercover plan."

Sirius blinked. "You've been wearing your pink slippers this whole time?"

"no, but that's not what we're talking about right now."

They both turned to look at Cassius.

"It should be… easier, if they don't think to look closer." He crossed his arms. "I just have to do what they expect me to do."

"Like what?"

"Nothing major, of course, but something like…" Cassius shrugged, grasping for an example, "like putting my name in for the Triwizard Tournament."

"really?" Sans quirked a brow. "seems to me they couldn't know either way."

"There's no point in risking them learning that I didn't put my name in."

Sirius nodded, though it was resigned. "I suppose that makes sense."

"Besides," Cassius continued, "it's not like it'll even matter." He sighed, as if disappointed, but he actually looked faintly relieved at the thought. "It's not like I'll be chosen. I'm a Slytherin, after all."

"don't jinx it."

"Of course I won't jinx it. Why would I—?"

"no, i mean… you know, the phrase? 'don't jinx it', like…" Trying to explain probably wouldn't be worth the bother, so Sans just shook his head. "eh, never mind."

"…Sure."

"Things don't always go as planned," Sirius remarked, almost warningly.

Thinking of the new dents in ceiling of the transfiguration classroom, and the fact that it had only been the first session of many, Sans sighed. "ain't that the truth."

But that's the thing about plans: first contact with the enemy and all that. They'd work things out on the fly, if needed, and that's what really matters.

In the end, it's just a matter of moving forward and seeing how things go.

Author's Note:

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or Undertale.

As they say, the best laid plans often go astray.
(This isn't about me missing the first, I swear.)

I hope you're all doing alright. It seems like each month is getting wilder than the next, stacking up and up, and everything's so exhausting all the time.
But we just gotta keep on keeping on!

It may not be the most motivational thing, but sometimes that's all ya got to work with.

Updates around the first of every month (sorry 'bout that).
Thank you for all of the favorites, follows, and reviews!

DraconiumWolf: Thanks for the reviews! I went back to chapter 21 to write that out a bit clearer. Basically, when I wrote that the glamour "compensates", I meant that it doesn't fall apart when the arm detaches. Instead, it just makes it look like he only has one arm. Hopefully that makes more sense now!
And feel free to use any headcanons from this story. Sharing stuff like that is the whole point of fanfiction, after all!

BLANK: I have an update schedule, it's just been hard to keep up lately. For this story, I (try to) post on the first of the month. As you can see by the fact that it's not the first… yeah, sometimes stuff really doesn't go to plan!

Join the Discord if you're interested! Invite code: m3CFXnC

Stay safe out there, and I'll see ya on the flipside, everyone!