Chapter Text
Robbie Rotten rubbed his hands together with glee. This was it! This was the invention that would finally get rid of Sportaflop - for good. He tinkered with it a little, adjusting the knobs minutely, the habit of a perfectionist.
He’d already placed the sensor that would connect Sportacus to the machine earlier that day; the fool didn’t realize that the “friendly” pat on the back Robbie gave him would seal his doom.
He allowed himself a maniacal laugh before laboriously dragging the machine out of the hatch and into Lazytown proper, his gray-green eyes scanning the area for any sign of Sportacus, ignoring for once the bright sun that was the bane of his existence.
_
Robbie found him at the baseball diamond, of course - those wretched children certainly loved baseball. After his own ill-advised foray into the sport, watching them running around the field left a sour taste in his mouth.
He set up the machine behind a nearby tree - he hadn’t put on a disguise, but everyone was so enthralled by their stupid sports that they didn’t notice him at work. His keen eye saw that Sportacus still wore the sensor he had placed on him - a lucky break. He had brought a backup just in case, but it looked as though that wouldn’t be necessary. He almost laughed again, but caught himself in time. It wouldn’t do to be discovered now.
This machine, provided it worked correctly (with the blind pride of a true villain, he had no doubt that it would), would turn Sportacus back into a baby. A baby! The idea delighted him. What harm could a mere baby do? Once Sportakook was helpless, the town would finally be his again. And who would care for the infant Sportacus afterwards? Not my problem!
Taking a deep breath, his face broke into a sinister smile. This would be the last time he would ever see Sportacus running around, causing him no end of grief. Playing with the children, smiling, laughing…
Did his hand hesitate over the button, just for a moment? If it did, no one else was around to see it.
As the machine crackled to life, he looked up just in time to see the errant baseball flying straight towards him.
_
He woke up with the children gathered around, their faces a mix of worry and fear.
“What happened? Are you okay??”
He expected to have one hell of a headache, but surprisingly enough he felt fine. No… better than fine. He’d never felt this good in his life. Did that baseball knock something lose in his brain? Was he having delusions?
“I’m fine! Get away from me!” he growled, pulling himself to a sitting position. Did his… voice sound different too?
“Sportacus!” Stephanie stepped away, her brow furrowed. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m not Sportacus, you idiot child-”
The words and the usual venom that supplied them froze in his throat. Was that…
Across the field, behind a tree, Robbie Rotten was sitting up, a dazed look on his face, something in his hand…
As the other Robbie opened his hand and looked questioningly at what was contained there, the real Robbie’s heart sank.
The other sensor.
An uncontrollable tremor ran through Robbie as he looked down at himself. Instead of the familiar pinstripes, there was nothing but blue. Blue pants, blue boots, blue bracers, that obnoxious S on his belt…
This can’t be happening.
“Robbie!” Trixie said accusingly, and he flinched out of instinct. But she was yelling at the other Robbie, who had to be none other than the hated Sportaflop. Even on Robbie’s face, his dopey expression was unmistakable. “What did you do to Sportacus?”
Sportacus rubbed his head, where the baseball had hit. “I… I didn’t…”
Robbie sprang to his feet (which took much less energy than he was used to, and he almost flung himself face-first into the dirt in the process) and stomped over to where Sportacus was sitting. “Give me that, you idiot!” he hissed, snatching the sensor out of his hand.
Sportacus looked up at him, the few neurons in his brain clearly firing at top speed. “...Robbie? What… happened?”
“You ruined it! Like you ruin everything! You… absolute moron!”
Sportacus finally noticed the machine beside him. “How…”
“Obviously this is not what I intended! Move, I’m going to fix what you screwed up.” Shoving Sportacus out of the way, he knelt beside the machine. He slapped one sensor on each of them, more roughly than was necessary, and switched on the machine.
Nothing.
Nothing but feeble sparks.
“What??”
Robbie punched it in impotent fury, receiving only bruised knuckles for his trouble.
“Why won’t this stupid thing work?”
The kids huddled a few feet away, clearly frightened. Robbie glanced at Sportacus to see his reaction and took some grim pleasure in noting the helpless look on his face. For once, he couldn’t play the hero.
But as soon as the look came, it passed, and Sportacus stood up, smiling as he always did.
“It’s okay, guys! I guess one of Robbie’s inventions went wrong- but we’ll fix it!”
“I’ll fix it,” Robbie hissed from the ground beside him.
“What if he can’t?” Stingy asked, his normally shrill voice gone quiet.
Sportacus put his fists on his hips and grinned at him. God, it was weird to see him in his usual pose, in a body so unaccustomed to it.
“I’m sure he can! Robbie is a genius!” He looked down at Robbie, and the villain saw the stern glare behind the smile. An unspoken message, agree with me, so the kids won’t be afraid.
It was so tempting to ignore that look and tell them it was impossible to fix, that their hero was now trapped in the sub-par body of his worst enemy. That he’d never be able to save anyone again.
Robbie sighed inwardly. “That’s right!” he said brightly. Sportacus would be able to detect the sarcasm in his voice, but the children wouldn’t. “I’ll get this working, and you’ll have your hero back in a jiffy!”
They breathed a sigh of relief. “That’s good,” Stephanie said, a smile slowly coming back to her face, but then it melted away again. “But Sportacus! What if someone needs help?”
“Then Robbie will help them,” Sportacus said, his smile beginning to look awfully sinister from where Robbie was sitting.
_
Robbie had carried the machine back to his lair with no trouble at all - it really was amazing how strong Sportacus’s body was. Bringing it out to the field in the first place, he had left grooves in the dirt from where he’d had to drag it - he felt a twinge of satisfaction at how Sportacus must be suffering in his body.
Sportaflop, who was of course following him back to the lair, and shooting daggers at Robbie’s back the entire way.
“You don’t have to follow me, you know,” he grumbled, setting the machine on a work table and fumbling around for tools. “It’s not like you’ll be any help.”
Sportacus stumbled, and steadied himself on the table. “Are you always this tired, Robbie?” he asked, beads of sweat forming on his forehead.
Robbie glanced up at him, and had to grin. “Yes. I suppose you’d better get used to it. No telling how long this is going to take.”
As he opened up the machine and Sportacus took a shaky seat on the orange chair, he had an awful idea.
What if… he didn’t fix it?
Okay, so this was hardly ideal, and not what he’d had in mind, but… Sportacus was still all but helpless right now. He certainly was in no condition to save anyone, or go flippity-flopping all over town.
And surely, what he’d said about Robbie being a hero in his place - that was just a joke, right?
Looking up from the machine’s inner workings, a smile spread across his face. “Sportaf- I mean, Sportacus… Can I get you anything? Cake? Hot chocolate?”
“No thank you,” Sportacus responded feebly, his annoyance with Robbie forgotten in his exhaustion. “Do you have any sportscandy? Or water?”
“Of course,” he said sweetly, heading for the fridge. He poured Sportacus a glass of water, and greedily eyed the slice of cake within. He’d need some energy to “fix” the machine; maybe he’d take a quick snack break first.
Grabbing a nearby fork, he took a generous bite, relishing the comforting texture and sweetness, and then suddenly everything went black.
_
He awoke sometime later, feeling groggy and sluggish (although that was hardly unusual), to a strangely familiar deep voice.
“Robbie, eat this -”
He pushed the object away and tried to go back to sleep, but the voice was insistent.
“Robbie! You have to eat this if you want to feel better!”
“I don’t caaare,” he groaned, and the voice sighed.
“Fine, if that’s how you want to be,” and then something strange was in Robbie’s mouth, the stranger holding his jaw shut, forcing him to chew.
“Mmph!” Robbie grunted in indignation, trying to sit up and inadvertently swallowing whatever it was he had been fed.
Suddenly the fog around his brain seemed to lift, and energy came flowing back into his body, bringing with it the memory of his situation.
Sportacus - in Robbie’s body, that was going to be hard to get used to - gave him a weak smile. “Did you forget that my body can’t process sugar?”
Robbie grumbled and pulled himself into a sitting position with the help of the chair’s orange fur. With Sportacus’s strength, he didn’t really need to, but old habits died hard. “How do you live like this?”
Sportacus shrugged, and Robbie noticed for the first time beads of sweat on his forehead. “Did you… drag me onto the chair?”
“Yes,” Sportacus said, tilting his head like he didn’t understand why Robbie would ask. “I wasn’t fast enough to catch you, but I didn’t want to just leave you lying on the floor.”
Robbie snorted. “Why not?”
Sportacus blinked at him. It was strange seeing such an innocent expression on Robbie’s own face. “Because it… probably wasn’t comfortable?”
“I tried to turn you into a baby, and it’s my fault that you’re in my body now, and you were worried that I wasn’t comfortable?”
Sportacus looked at him blankly, then started to laugh. Robbie flinched, but it didn’t look like violence was forthcoming - the elf really seemed to think it was funny. “I guess you’re right, Robbie,” he chuckled, wiping away a tear. “Still, I’m not going to leave you on the floor.”
“Well, that’s up to you, I guess,” Robbie muttered.
“Besides, I’m sure you weren’t really going to turn me into a baby. Or at least, not forever. I don’t remember what it was like being a baby; if I didn’t need to save anyone, it probably would have been fun to be a baby again for a while!”
Robbie stared at him. “Yes, I was,” he said, speaking slowly, as if to a child. “Why wouldn’t I?”
“Well… I…”
“I’ve wanted you gone ever since the first day your stupid airship darkened the sky over my town! That’s the only thing I’ve wanted. That’s what I’ve been trying to do this entire time, you idiot! Get rid of you!”
Robbie didn’t like the naked display of emotion on Sportacus’s face - his face. Sportacus had never been good at hiding his feelings, and that didn’t change no matter what body he was in. He looked… hurt. Confused. Vulnerable.
“And get that stupid look off my face,” Robbie hissed, jumping out of the chair with more force than he intended. It really was almost too easy to move in this body. He breezed past Sportacus, sitting unmoving (for once) on the floor. He was glad to be back to work on the machine, where he didn’t have to look at him or think about the devastated expression on the hero’s face.
___
Robbie was ignoring Sportacus with such fervor that he didn’t even notice when the elf left. It had been surprisingly hard to climb the tunnel out of Robbie’s lair, and even harder to ascend the ladder to the airship. Once he reached the top, he was sweating profusely, out of breath, and more than ready to sleep, even though the sun had just gone down and it would be another hour or so until 8:08.
“Open,” he said hoarsely, and waited. And waited. And waited.
“...Open.”
Still nothing.
What is going on? Sportacus cleared his throat. “Open!” he said more forcefully, and banged on the hatch.
It took another minute of begging and pounding on the door before Sportacus remembered that the airship was voice-command activated.
He was dizzy, utterly exhausted, and clearly not sleeping in his own bed tonight.
His first thought was to go back to Robbie’s, and see if perhaps he had a spare chair or something that he could sleep on. But he dismissed that idea as soon as it occurred. Robbie hates me, he thought, and the realization made his heart sink. He knew the “villain” thought he was annoying, and sure, Robbie had tried to get him to leave Lazytown since he’d arrived. But none of those schemes had worked, and Sportacus had been sure that, given enough time, they’d become friends. He liked Robbie, as strange as he was. He was funny, and had a good heart deep down, and their rivalry had even been fun, in a way. But knowing that Robbie really, truly hated him and would be happier with him gone, made Sportacus feel more miserable than any body-switching machine or faulty voice-command ever could.
With newfound sorrow in his heart, he slowly began the long climb back down to the town.
_
Where was he going to stay tonight? Maybe with one of the kids? His misadventure must have taken longer than he thought, because once he reached the ground it was full dark and all the lights in the town were out.
No, I can’t wake them up. He knew better than anyone the importance of a good night’s sleep.
Well, there were always the benches. He chose the most comfortable-looking one and staggered over to it, collapsing in relief.
Summoning his last reserves of optimism and trying to ignore the cold reality, he forced himself to sleep. Tomorrow will be better. I’m sure.
___
Robbie worked on the machine until he was confident it was fixed, but he left a few odds and ends lying around to make it look unfinished, in case Sportacus came back to check up on it. Despite the turmoil of the day, he thought he might actually sleep tonight. For once he wasn’t wired on sugar (although not by choice), and for the first time since he could remember he slept through the night, and if he dreamed, he forgot them as soon as he woke up.