Title: Inner Beauty (1/8)
Authors: EagleWolf and Elixie
Rating: PG
Spoilers: It falls between Seasons 4 and 5, and in an A/U far far from wherever Joss would think to take it.
Disclaimer: Joss, Mutant Enemy, WB, UPN, FOX, and whoever else got themselves a sweet deal Sunnydale and its inhabitants own them. We just decided to use them for our own evil and completely profit free purposes.

Note: No Fraggles or Smurfs were harmed in the making of this story. However several did 'volunteer' to be part of the after party meal. Whoever made them owns them… We just borrowed them, and some string beans to use as floss. If you grow string beans check your garden, we may have taken them.

Dedication: To Wenchie, who helped bring us together. (Too late to apologize for that) It's been a hell of a ride, but we're off to conquer lands beyond the horizon.

Buffy felt dizzy, so she closed her eyes for a second. Suddenly she felt herself falling and landing on someone. Opening her eyes she saw… the lunch lady. Naked. With a scream she leapt up and looked down at herself. She was a man, and also naked. She let out another scream. The lunch lady sat up.

"Principal Snyder?" The big woman asked.

"Oh please let this be a bad dream." Buffy said out loud. That's when the lunch lady got a look at herself.

"What the bloody hell?!" she exclaimed. "I've got to find Buffy."

"I've got to find Giles." Buffy said at almost the same time.

"Buffy?"

"Giles?" That's when both of them heard the chuckling. Looking around they found a miniature pterodactyl of all things.

"Well Ripper old boy, not exactly how you pictured your first time with the slayer is it?"

"Ethan." Buffy and Giles growled at the same time.

After they had found their clothes, Buffy and Giles cornered the flying reptile.

"What's the big idea?" Buffy screamed at him.

"Buffy, please. Let's go about this in a logical fashion." Giles pulled her away.

"I knew you'd want to be the logica…awk!" Ethan squawked as Giles grabbed him around the throat with both hands and began to throttle him. "Ripper…*gag*…I…can't …*choke*…change …you…back…if…"Giles released him. "It wasn't my idea to be here. Let alone looking like this."

"It is a rather interesting choice, Ethan." Giles hid a snicker. "So why are you here and why do we look like this?"

"The Powers That Be put a curse on me. I have to do something special in order to be changed back. And since I have no choice, I figured I'd have a little fun with it." Somehow he managed to sneer with the beak.

"So what's this 'something special'?" Buffy asked still trying not to beat the thing senseless.

"That would be telling. Let's just say it involves the two of you and the first Slayer and Watcher."

"Then why did you switch us with Snyder and the lunch lady?"

"To give you a new perspective on things. I wonder how your esteemed former principal and, Bertha I think her name is, are handling their new outlook."

Buffy and Giles looked at each other in horror. They hadn't thought about the true residents of their present bodies.

"Your place." Buffy said. And they took off running.

"Hey Giles," Buffy gasped as they ran towards Giles' apartment. "Didn't Snyder... err die when the mayor ate him?"

They had trouble adjusting to their new bodies. Buffy found her legs were shorter than even she was used to, and Giles found parts of him wobbling where there had never been parts before. He reached up and tried to hold his breasts in place as they bounced.

"Yes.. We need to research.. as soon as we.. Can't talk." Giles panted. He'd never felt so unfit, sweat was pouring down his face. Err her face (this is where the author got confused )

He noticed a gold band around his finger as he did so. He frowned and slowed down to a slow walk. "Buffy," he managed to pant out getting her attention.

She glanced around to find Giles falling behind and stopped, letting him/her catch up. "What is it Giles? We have to get to them before they try to go anywhere. And you didn't answer my question."

"If I knew the answer I wouldn't have suggested research." He glared at her.

"How did you manage that."

"What?"

"The patented 'Giles' glare. Although it does look funny on the lunch lady's face."

Giles gave a frustrated sigh. "I really don't think that matters at the moment. What I was trying to point out to you before you changed the subject, is that it would appear our current bodies are married." He held up the hand with the ring.

She looked down at her hand to see the matching one. "Snyder and the lunch lady? Eeewww."

"She does have a name you know. I think Ethan said it was Bertha. When we're out in public it would be best if you called me that."

Buffy grinned, not a pleasant sight on Snyder's features. "Okay, Bertha. It's just hard to imagine those two having smoochies. Although, considering what they were doing when we switched…very shudder-worthy."

They reached the door to Giles' apartment without any incident, and were about to enter when Giles stopped. "We have to handle this very carefully. Whichever one is in your body may have your strength and considering the state these two are in, we may not be able to fight them should it come down to it. With luck, they'll be too traumatized to do anything."

They quietly entered the living room to find the luggage, from a retreat the two of them were supposed to go on, scattered about the room, and the two people they were looking for huddled in corners on opposite sides of the room. At the sight of Buffy/Snyder and Giles/Bertha, the one in Buffy's body promptly screamed and fainted. "That must be Snyder." Buffy giggled.

"Buffy", Giles said sternly, "This is not the time to start laughing. But I think you're right. That would appear to be Principal Snyder." He walked softly over to his body. "You must be Bertha." He said quietly.

The woman in his body stared at him horror stricken. When he tried to draw closer to offer some reassurance, she swung at him. "I've had about enough of this. First a giant snake tries to eat my husband only to shit him out again. Do you know how long it took to get rid of that stench! Then we end up switching bodies with the librarian and his little hussy. I told him I wanted to move away from Sunnyhell, but noooo. He had to stay here. Well we're definitely getting out of here now!" All of this was punctuated with punches and kicks aimed at Giles, though few of them connected. Finally, Buffy had enough.

"What a bitch!" and punched the lunch lady in the face knocking her out. Giles looked at his prone body.

"Did you have to hit me so hard? When I get back in there, I'm going to have a black eye."

"We don't have time to worry about that now. What are we gonna do with them?"

Giles thought for a moment. "Well the others aren't expecting to see us for a few days. They think we're on a retreat to try and mend our relationship. So, as much as I loathe the idea, we'll have to tie them up and put them in the basement. That way at least they'll stay out of trouble."

"I am so gonna kill Ethan." Buffy groaned. At that instant, they both remembered that he had been left behind in their hurry to keep Snyder and Bertha from going anywhere.

"I don't think you want to do that." A voice said from behind them. They turned to find Ethan hopping through the door. "I'm the only one who can send you back."

Buffy grabbed him. "How did you get here?"

Ethan stretched his wings. "How do you think? I have to admit, It was worth looking like this just to see the two of you trying to run." He snorted, "What's the matter, Ripper? Do you need a sports bra?"

Buffy tossed him across the room. "Tit's... I mean, it's not that funny."

"Buffy, we can do without the puns, I think."

"It wasn't what I meant to say."

Giles/Bertha turned to Ethan. "You said something about the first Watcher and Slayer. What exactly did you mean?"

Ethan giggled (that's right, giggled) and said, "All I can tell you is that you are connected very closely to them."

Buffy reached out to grab Ethan around the neck but he was too quick for her and hovered out of the way.

"You're gonna have to be faster than that to catch me, Slayer." His last word was dripping with sarcasm.

Giles in the meantime had made his own grab for his own friend, only to find Ethan's beak was as sharp as it looked. "Damn you Ethan," he cried as he looked at his bleeding hand.

Ethan just grinned, which looked really weird on the beak of a pterodactyl, and proceeded to hover just out of Buffy's reach.

"Nyer Nyer."

The next second Ethan felt the tips of Buffy's finger tips as she jumped up to capture him, he decided he wasn't in the best position if he stayed where he was, so he took off zooming around the room with one very irate Slayer chasing after him.

She managed to corner him by the desk, knocking several items off of it in the process. For a second she was distracted when she thought she heard an 'oomph' coming from the stapler, followed by a 'yipe' from the hole punch, but quickly forgot it as Ethan tried to fly over her head.

"Not so fast, bird brain." She said as she grabbed for his feet.

Suddenly, Ethan plummeted, having been struck by a glass thrown by Giles.

"I knew being the bowler on my University cricket team would come in handy."

Giles picked up the vase from on top of the TV, and placed it on top of Ethan. It was heavy enough so that there was no way the sorcerer would be able to tip it off, and clear apart from the etching on the front so they could see what he was up to.

Buffy looked at Giles and sighed. "I'll tie up these two and drag them downstairs. You start getting the books together."

"According to this legend, the first slayer was a demigod who was trying to become more powerful, so she attempted to create life. But since she wasn't powerful enough, a vampire was created instead. By the time the gods above her found out, it had already turned quite a few people. Her punishment was to go into the world as a human, albeit with some advantages, and kill them." Giles continued reading silently for a few moments. "And it would appear the First Watcher was her lover, another demigod, who feared for her safety and asked to be with her. So they assigned him the task of making sure she was always prepared to fight any evil that should appear."

"That doesn't explain how a new Slayer is called."

"Well I would imagine that, since vampires still roam the Earth, she just keeps getting reincarnated. but without the memory of her previous selves."

Buffy thought for a moment. "But then how do you explain the fact that the next slayer is already alive when the old one dies?"

Giles made a frustrated sound. "How the bloody hell should I know. Maybe because this way when she's called, she's old enough to do more then wet her nappies."

"Geez, Giles, touchy much?" Buffy pouted, not a pleasant sight on Snyder's face. "After all, you're the one with the books. I thought maybe it would say in one of them."

Buffy sighed and plonked herself down on the couch. Her mouth widened in the form of an "O", and she stared at Giles until he put down the book to look at her.

"Yes, Buffy?"

"So the slayer, the demigod... is always reincarnated as the slayer?"

"Yes, I just told you that."

"Giles. I'm the slayer."

"Good Lord."

They turned as they heard what sounded rather like a pterodactyl clapping it's wings together, to find Ethan in fact doing exactly that.

"They figured it out. A point to the watcher slayer team." His voice echoed as he spoke through the glass.

Suddenly Buffy giggled, the sound was strange coming from Snyder. Her vocal chords began to hurt as if the man hadn't used his laughing muscles in a long time. "Ethan's stuck in the cone of silence."

Giles just rolled his eyes. That's when he caught sight of the things that had fallen from the desk. "Holey! Steve!" He screeched and ran over to them. "Oh I'm so sorry! Are you hurt?" He started to cry as he placed them back on the desk. "Oh dear. I don't know what's wrong with me."

Buffy looked at him for a moment. "Giles? What's wrong?"

Ethan chuckled from his vase. "Yeah what's the matter old boy? Do you have PMS or something?"

Giles promptly burst into tears again. "I do NOT have PMS." He said angrily. "It's probably just that I'm tired. After all we don't know how long these bodies have been awake. That along with the shock, I'm sure we just need some sleep."

"I'll take the couch." Buffy sighed.

Giles thought for a moment. "Actually, it might be better if we slept together."

"Giles!"

"Wh-what I m-meant to say was, we should stay as close to each other as possible until we solve this."

"Oh. Ok"

As they started up the stairs to Giles' bedroom, Giles asked. "I don't have PMS, do I?"

"I don't know. I have nothing to compare to."

They failed to hear Ethan as he muttered to himself. "Knew he couldn't figure it out that fast."

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