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FIC: What the Ohio Board of Toursim Will Never Tell You--pt 3
full header & chapter one || chapter two ||




Chapter Three—Shit Like This Only Happens In Comic Books, Dude

Lucinda & Matilda hope he eats the weak-minded kittens if the spurned suitor succeeds. 1:04 PM August 05 2009

Lucinda says the Snake Cult Leader must have a care and watch out for his father's spurned suitor. She wants to turn him into a basilisk. 1:03 PM August 05 2009

Lucinda says the nice young water demon that came to tea must go to the Concert to prevent the Abyss from swallowing the city. 10:23 AM August 05 2009

According to Lucinda the first night of the apocalypse concert will see the crowning of a new demon queen and witches of prophecy will cause great mischief. 7:19 AM August 05 2009

from the twitter account of EDCatz



Xander opened his eyes. Bright lights, white walls, muffled noises that...hospital. Didn't smell or sound quite right, quite enough but, yeah, had to be a hospital.

“Who are you? Where's my brother?”

The guy looming—or attempting to, Xander had certainly seen far more impressive looming—was probably about Xander's age, skinny as hell, with thin black hair hanging almost to his shoulders, lank and greasy and sweat, and tear-streaked eyeliner around hazel eyes. Did he mention skinny as hell?

“That's—Mikey, that's Gee,” a voice somewhere behind the skinny looming guy said.

“No, it's not, Frank,” Loomy-guy said.

“No, I'm not.”

“Who are you and where's my brother?”

“Xander and I hope in me and the girls were on the ball,” Xander muttered. “Mojo hangovers suck—and no, I didn't do this. I was caught in it just as much as him.” At least Xander was assuming but Loomy-Guy looked too scared and shaken and kinda clueless. His senses might be wonky and two eyes still making him dizzy with the shift in depth perception even with the slight fuzzyblurry vision, but his instincts said this guy probably was caught in the mess as much as Xander was, and possibly even more unaware.

“Doc's coming,” a tall guy with freaking scary hair and a soft kinda high tenor voice said slipping into view from around a curtained partition.

Xander sighed in relief. “Miller! Thank the gods above and below for small mercies. Unless you found anything else wrong, this is just a mojo blast. We need to get to the school ASAP though, so—release papers? Serious. It's five by five. Just a little oopsie of the oh shit variety.” At least he'd landed under Miller's care. The ER doc had stumbled into too many odd things over the years and had finally demanded answers a year or so before. He was good about letting them slip through and making up excuses for injuries that didn't get police attention.

Dr. Miller Cunningham startled and stared. “Any blurred or double vision?”

“Miller, depth perception, hasn't been my thing since oh-two,” Xander snorted.

Miller's eyes widened in recognition. “How the hell do you get yourself into these situations, Harris?”

Xander looked at Loomy Guy. “Are things supposed to be a bit blurry—not real bad, just a touch out of focus and fuzzy on the edges?”

“Gerard squints all the time when he draws anymore. I think he needs glasses,” Loomy guy shrugged.

“Headache?” Miller demaneded.

“Mojo Hangover style. Not concussiony.”

“You sure?”

“Hello? King of head injuries here,” Xander rolled his eyes. And damn that felt weird to have two eyes moving instead of one.

“Point. Take care of that body better than you do your own while you're in it, huh?”

“I will. Now, uhm, release papers...need to get to the School and see what the hells even happened and how to reverse it.”

“You want me to call the School?”

“Nah. Faith was within screaming distance. They're already on it. She's probably got Andrew already on his way back to the school to hit the books and start figuring out what the hell happened.”

“Blood sugar was a little low on the screens. Doubt your new skin ate today so they can put that out as the cause for the fainting. Low Bloodsugar. Easy enough,” Miller nodded. “Straight to the school, Harris.”

“Plan on it. I want my body back. I can't fight in this one.”

Miller snorted. “Be right back.”

“That's not Gerard,” Short guy said. “He doesn't move or talk like Gerard.”

“Told you it wasn't,” Loomy guy answered. “Who are you and what the fuck is going on?”

“My name's Xander Harris. Mind telling me who I'm in and who you all are?” Xander sighed.

“I'm Mikey. You're in my brother Gerard. That's Frank. Ray. Bob. James. Matt. Brian and Worm.”



~


Gerard came to with a squawk and his nose bouncing against a girl's butt. A small arm tightened around his waist almost painfully and a swat that hurt landed on his ass.

“Be still,” a girl's voice ordered.

Gerard found himself carefully deposited on a couch and the girl that had been carrying him—carrying him over her shoulder!--reached and started feeling his head fingers poking and prodding as they carded through hair.

“Be still. Xander's too good at getting head injuries not to check,” she ordered. “I don't feel any knots. You got a headache or anything?”

“N-no,”

“Good. I'm Tasha and that's Andrew.”

“Gerard,” he swallowed. She was tiny, like maybe--maybe--all of five foot tall and maybe paler than he was with the tan he'd gotten with the outdoor shows this summer, her hair was orangey-brown tight afro pulled back in a big poofy pony tail. “I—I”m Gerard.”

“It'll be okay, Gerard, this kinda stuff happens. We'll get you back where you belong before you know it. Andrew's a really good witch. And we'll have the Coven over here to help soon enough. There's always Willow and the Devon coven and the Council library too.” she said reassuringly and patted his knee. He nodded. He had no clue what the hell she was talking about but really—honestly--was scared enough to about piss his pants and not really going to ask. This was...this had to be some kind of nightmare. He passed out on stage and hit his head or something because shit like this just fucking did. Not. Happen.

“Books...just..argh. Are you from this dimension?” a blonde guy bounced into Gerard's line of view. He had sandy hair in kinda odd spikes and was bouncing and vibrating.

“Huh?” Gerard gaped.

“I mean where were you before you ended up in Xander in the Q parking lot?”

“On stage. Singing.”

“Okay but where?”

“The Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland, Ohio. There's a big benefit concert that's lasting three days—the Cleveland Rocks Storm Benefit. Everything's going to rebuilding from the tornados that hit Cleveland in March...”

“More of the Little Apocalypse That Could,” Andrew snorted. “Okay, so you're probably still in the right dimension.”

“Uh huh,” Gerard managed. This shit only happened in fucking comic books. Really. The fuck? Okay, if this was real? Not freaking out and fucking losing his mind would be good. Oh fuck. Mikey. Mikey was going to be losing it. Goddamn. Whoever the hell was in his body better not hurt Mikey. “Who am I in? He won't hurt my brother?”

“Xan? No, Xander won't hurt your brother. Xander's the White Knight.” Andrew shook his head and started pacing, mumbling about moon phases and body swap spells. The way he was pacing and just his appearance in general? Really, really reminded Gerard of som bizarre freaky alternate dimension combination of Brian and Frank, only maybe a few inches taller and without tattoos and piercings. Andrew stopped dead in his pacing. “Did you make a Wish?”

“A wish?”

“Yeah. Did you? And never ever do that because there's demons that grant wishes and they're never ever good.”

“Nooo...”

“Xander didn't make a wish. I know that. He was with Anya for—like three years. D'Hoffryn would still like to torture him and have him as a slave for a century or two before skinning and dismembering him because Anya nad Hallie got their redemptions.”

Gerard stared.

Andrew paced and babbled and bounced while he paced. Oh god, he was fucking scary. Like some deranged evil twin of what a kid would be like if someone managed to combine Frank and Brian's DNA and make a scary hyper little freaky guy that was scary smart as well as scary hyper.

A snorted choked snicker caused Gerard to jerk his head up and look around. The girl, Tasha was gone somewhere. Female voices, muffled and too quiet and far to make out what they were saying, but definitely female voices from somewhere beyond the door behind him. The room was...like a massive living room. Assorted groupings of couches and chairs and coffe tables scattered around. Three round tables with high back wooden chairs at them. Shelves along the wall...actually most of the walls were covered by book cases and shelves nad where there wasn't book cases or shelves weapons were hung on the wall. There were at least a half dozen trunks scattered about. The behind him had three large archways which looked like they led into a library. At least all he saw of the room—rooms?--beyond were rows of bookshelves.

The purple dudes were scattered around standing almost at attention, sorta, maybe. They all seemed to be wearing brown leather pants and loose kinda rough wool looking shirts that were somewhere between pirate-like with puffy sleeves and some sort of peasant tunic in a fantasy or medieval movie. They were all tall-ish to tall. The shortest one was maybe as tall as he was—if he was himself—or just a bit more and the tallest might have an inch or two on Ray. And they were...actually, kinda gorgeous in a weird purpley way. Their skin light violet and their hair so dark it was almost black but definitely definitely purple and..from really really unbelievably handsome to drop-dead unearthly gorgeous. But they were mother fucking purple.

Still hot though.

Gerard jerked and looked around Andrew was still babbling and pacing and kinda getting more wound up with flailing arms and everything. The purple guys were all standing still and quiet and..

I'm in your head, dork. You're loud and distracting. Don't tell anyone you can hear me. Xander and I don't let on. It's really really best. Andrew would get ideas about trying to do something like that and just no. It's too dangerous and Xan and I didn't want the damn spell in the first place but we're stuck with it so shut up about it. We've got it figured out that we can keep to ourselves and just talk when we have to. The woman's voice in his head said. How would you like everyone in your thoughts all the time? No. Drive us all nuts and half the kids couldn't manage to control their thoughts or mind their manners enough not to go digging in someone else's head and then there's the ones that would try the power trips and taking over someone else's head. So no. Shut up about it.

Body swapping. Magical Telepathy. Purple guys. This was too fucking weird. No matter how much fun thinking about suddenly falling into a comic book or getting superpowers might be. This was too fucking much.

Calm down.

Why did you even tell me you were here? Er in my head? His head? Why are you still in my head if you're connected to him?

Connection has a physical grounding through skin because Xan and magic are kinda non-mixy.

Non-mixy doesn't sound good for getting back in my body! Gerard thought frantically and he was talking to himself-that wasn't new, nor was answering himself either really but he had a woman's voice answering him not his own and...

I only let you know I could hear you before you embarrassed yourself checking Kumquat packages or something.

Gerard blushed beet red.

“What? It's not like you have to be naked or anything. That kinda stuff is just Hollywood slipping some t 'n' a in on because all the witches are hot in the movie.” Andrew's pacing stopped abruptly and he stared at Gerard. “Well, at least not for this. There are some you have to be naked for...”

Gerard blinked staring at Andrew wondering what the hell he was talking about.

“You freaking? You look like you're freaking. Seriously, no need to freak yet. This kinda stuff happens. Faith and Buffy got their bodies swapped and Xander got split into two people before by a Toth demon, and stuff like this seriously happens all the time to us. We've always gotten everyone back in the right body or right dimension or whatever. C'mon the world's still here. We've actually got a pretty good track record. Just ease up on the freakage until we know what it is and how bad getting it undone is going to be. You piss off any witches lately?”

Gerard stared. “Not...uhm witches? I...don't know any...”

“Pissed off exes that would go all psycho and find a witch or summon a demon or anything?”

“Eliza?” Gerard squeaked. “But I don't think so...she's like all happy with the guy she's with now and I think they have a baby or are going to have a baby? Some shit like that I don't...” Hell, he didn't know. He didn't know where he even was.

Breathe, Breathe. It's okay. Geek Boy is right. And you're in the reading room off the basement library. Not sure if he bothered to warn you but don't try to read anything out loud not even to sound something out okay? All the dangerous books are down there. A tribe of Klatka –something like that—demons made the basement library under the main building of the school. It's practically a magical Fort Knox with all the warding on it. You're safe there. Seriously. I promise. You could probably survive an apocalypse in basement library.

An apocalypse? Shouldn't that be The?

No such thing as The when we end up with at least two or three a year to stop.

Two or three apocalypses a year?

Yep. That's the job. Saving the world. Fighting demons. Fight hard and leave a scarred up corpse before you're thirty. Whole destiny thing really sucks.

Before you're thirty?

Dude. You're in the body of a one-eyed guy who has a shitload of scars and still has stitches on his shin from getting clawed by a demon last week. Xan's twenty-seven.

Gerard felt the patch but hadn't...he reached up and shakily lifted it, sliding his finger tips over rough scarred...And now that she said it..his shin did itch and ache a little.

“Uh yeah. He lost that back in Sunnydale five, no six years ago. Minion of the first evil squished his eyeball with his thumbs. Xan got rescued before he put the other eye out. Any visions? The Minion called Xander the One Who Sees. But no one's ever figured out what Xan sees. So visions? Don't dismiss 'em as hallucinations just because he hasn't had one yet doesn't mean it won't happen. Especially when the First Evil wanted him blinded. Ya know?”

Gerard stared.


~


None of them quite wanted to admit it or believe it, but no way in hell was that Gerard Way. It just wasn't. No freaking way in hell.

He didn't move like Gerard. Didn't walk like Gerard. Didn't...just...didn't. He didn't talk like Gerard either. The voice was Gerard's. The speech patterns, even the accent wasn't. Not a hint of Jersey in his voice. Not the least teeny tiny little hint. Hell, Bob was surprised he hadn't picked up a Jersey accent by osmosis. While they'd all always pulled off just fine in interviews and everything, on the bus was a whole different story. It got bad. They all got lazy, and well, you learned to speak Jersey out of self-preservation because your sanity would go soon enough repeatedly asking “what the fuck did you say?”

Hell, he even sounded a little less nasally.

Nor did he freak at having a sword point held to his throat by a teenage girl who probably wasn't old enough to vote, maybe not even drive when they were walking across the private school grounds to it's main building. He didn't even really seem all that surprised that four girls popped out of fucking no where.

“It's me, Lexie. Xander. Call Faith if you don't believe me. Body swap screw up.”

“Uh huh.” A slightly older young woman said standing off to the side.

“Watch it, Dawnpatrol. Girls who grow up on Hellmouths and still end up staking their first date because they didn't notice he was vamped just don't get to give any crap about getting in the way of a bodyswap spell.”

“I'm going to beat you, Xan,” she rolled her eyes.

“You're kidding, right?” the one holding the sword to Gerard's throat—no matter who was in the body that was Gerard throat said.

“Oh I hate you, Xander!” the young woman said.

“ALEXIS! SWORD NOW! Before he faints.”

The sword was away from Gerard's neck and whoever it was had an arm around Mikey's waist, grabbed Mikey's hand and put it to his throat. “See, not a scratch. It's okay.”

“Sword! You get killed Gerard dies,” Mikey gasped out.

“Don't think it works like that but he'd be stuck with my body.”

“I WANT GERARD BACK! IN HIS BODY ALIVE AND GERARD!” Mikey howled.

“We'll figure it out. It's okay. No need for major freakage yet. This isn't even near freakage level.”

“It's not?” Brian demanded incredulously.

“Nope. This is annoying gods damn it all why is it always me. Par for the course for the Zeppo. It just doesn't pay to freak over that anymore. It really doesn't. Save the freakage for apocalypses.”

“Is apocalypses even a word?” Frank frowned.

“You know what the plural for apocalypse is? Kinda an on going debate actually. We have three or four a year anymore.”

They all stared. He was as fucking nuts as Gerard, but no way in hell was that Gerard. Group hallucination? Something bad from catering? There had to be a rational explanation. But that wasn't Gerard...and they were all following along because what else could they do? Mikey seemed like he was on the edge of a breakdown.


~


“MIKEY!” Gerard cried and ran for his brother.

“Gee?” Mikey said uncertainly.

“Yeah, it's me, Mikey.”

“Depth perception isn't your friend?” Brian frowned and stared.

“Nope.”

Gerard blinked as the guy in his body reached out and lifted the eye patch from his missing eye. “Not on speaking terms with depth perception anymore,” the guy snorted. “In fact it's making me kinda dizzy even without the fuzzy.”

“Fuck,” Bob breathed.

“How the fuck did that happen?” Frank demanded. “That shit doesn't just happen.”

“Minion of hell. Thought I saw too much. I was lucky the cavalry arrived before he put out both eyes.”

“I think you guys need to stay on school grounds. Maybe even in the library because damn it. If he's in you—he's going to be the target for every demon you've ever pissed off. Even if they figure out you're in him...can you fight?” Andrew wanted to know.

“I'm barely managing not to walk like I'm drunk.” Xander shot back. “Freaking Harmony Kendall would have been able to take me now—even before she was vamped.”

“Ow. Gerard. You're stronger now,” Mikey finally complained about the hug.

“Sorry, Mikes.”

“DEMONS!” Brian bellowed.

“Vampires, demons, werewolves, magic, hell dimensions, all that good stuff you see in horror movies? Well the movies got it hilariously wrong, but it's all real.” Xander answered.

“Do you like have demons after you, specifically?” Ray asked shakily.

Gerard watched his face scrunch up into a kind of...rabbity looking wince. Mikey was right he had a stupid face sometimes.

“Uhm...yeah.”

“You have D'Hoffryn and his whole court. You have--”

“ANDREW!” Xander snapped. Gerard was sure the snap would have sounded less squawky if the guy had had his own voice. “Staying on the school grounds, maybe even just staying in the library. Nothing's getting through the wards down here. Well, nothing short of a full out Apocalypse is likely too. The rest of you go on business as usual except for him needing a few days off to rest.”

“I'm staying,” Mikey said mutinously.

“At night fine, but if you have places you're supposed to show up—you need to be there. No one will think anything is majorly wrong if you're where you're supposed to be judging by how tight you two are so it'll be let slide more. You're where you need to be and acting normal. No one's going to think anything of it. Especially not until we know what the hells is going on.”

“I can't call the coven until morning,” Andrew frowned. “Do you think we should try Willow?”

“Not yet. See what you can dig up first. Call Giles though. He can stick the Legacy morons on going through the Council Library.”


chapter four