Strangers in a Stranger Land


Notes

Well, it's not a story about the Slayers group per se...it's techically about real-life Slayers fans based on the cast (although it takes one brief trip into the Slayers world). But trust me, you will find it funny. I repeat, you will enjoy it - under threat of Dragon Slave...


"Excuse me."

Na na na.

"Excuse me - !"

Na na na.

"EXCUSE me - !."

Whistle.

"I have to be direct - "

" - la la la - "

"If I may please correct - "

" - la la la - "

"You're standing on my neck."

" - la la la - "

"You're standing on my neeeeeeck!"

" - la la la - "

"You're standing on my neck!"

"Excuse me!"

Zach thought for a moment, realized that the song would be starting again and halfway through if that were an actual part of the Daria soundtrack, and pulled off his headphones. "Yeah?"

"Do you have any desserts today?"

Zach looked down from the top of the drama-room staircase. "Uh-huh." He waited expectantly for Lora to say what she was almost certainly going to.

"Can I have them?"

There it was. "Have one of the peppermint patties," he said distantly and plugged himself back into the Sony Discman (tm).

"Hi, Zack."

He took off the headphones again. "Hi, Amelia."

"Hi, guys!"

"The jock is here."

"Shut up, Zach. Hey, Gary! Over here!"

At Positas Valley High School, the students made full use of the campus nature of the layout to enjoy an outdoor lunch in the quad. That was what the student handbook had to say about it, anyway. In reality, that was true only of the mainstream. The artistic types, the avant-garde the...people who didn't hang out with the right people, anyway, had to arrange different eating places.

"Guess what I got!," said Amelia once they had arranged the food.

"What?"

"NEXT tape 5."

A trench-coated arm suddenly encircled Amelia. "Want to be my special friend?"

She swatted Zach away. "What is with you today? You can all come over to see it." She primly rearranged her skirt. Lora noticed how nauseatingly well it matched her shirt and jacket.

"Leave Amelia alone," said Gary sternly. "Go play with your guitar or something."

"Play with my guitar?"

Lora quickly interrupted. "Can we go after school?"

"I'm free. I'm always free," said Zach.

"Thanks to your taste in clothing, yes," said Lora.

"Shut up."

"I can go," said Lora, finishing that thread right there. "Gary?"

"Um..."

"Practice, you know." Zach finished the excuse for him. "How about this evening?"

"That's okay."

The bell rang.

"I swear to god, lunch is getting shorter every day."

Gary stuffed his entire lunch in his mouth. "Lesh gosh..."

He swallowed the food.

"Let's go to English, Zach."

"Right."


Gary happily dreamed of feats of swordsmanship in medieval Europe, perhaps because he's based off of Gourry, but mainly because the teacher was currently covering "The Canterbury Tales".

"Can anybody give a primary theme of the reading last night? Zach?"

Zach had been drifting off as well, but he sat up as straight as he ever did and answered, "The overwhelming misery and despair intrinsic to the human spirit."

"No, Zach, that's more likely a primary theme of the music you were listening to last night instead of doing the reading. Andrea, do you know a theme?"

What smarted was that Zach actually had done the reading. It's just that he had also been watching Neon Genesis Evangelion (episode 25) at the time.

"The messages must have got a little garbled," he muttered to himself as he slipped back into semiconciousness. "I hate English."


SO YOU AGREE HE'S JUST LIKE ZEL?

YEAH! HE REALLY IS. ONLY NOT LIKE TRY ZEL. HE ISN'T THE MELLOW VERSION.

ZEL MELLOW?

"Lora, Amelia, what are you giggling about?"

"Sorry, Ms. Davies. We really think that these questions are clever."

Lora clenched her black-nailed fist dramatically. "Why does she always believe you?" she whispered to Amelia. "I hate math!"


"Hey."

Gary drooled slightly and remained asleep. With an effort, Zach got himself fully awake and pounded his friend. "Hey, quarterback. Ass off of the chair. The class is over."

"Hummmmmmmm." Gary muttered in his sleep. "Nup nup nup."

"Up." Zach accompanied the word with a particularly violent thump on Gary's head.

"K, k. Time for gym, right?"

"I don't know, you tell me."


"I'm going to pass out," said Amelia.

"I'm going to throw up," said Lora.

"I'm going to die," said Zach.

"I'm going to practice," said Gary.

"Shut up," Lora suggested.

Gary watched in amusement as his friends leaned against the wall in a row. "You people are in terrible shape. You should go out for something."

"Die."

"Not you, Zach, you don't have the team spirit." Gary turned to go. "Well, I'll see you at Amelia's at, um - "

"Seven," Amelia muttered, eyes half closed.

"Okay."

Someone ran over Lora's legs on their way out.

"I wish Slayers magic was real," she said.

"Fireball," said Zach happily.


She's into superstition,

Black cats and voodoo dolls

"I hate Ricky Martin."

"Me too."

"I don't," said Amelia from the backseat. "He's kind of catchy."

"But it's Lora's car and I'm controlling the other front seat," said Zach. "Overruled. Besides - catchy? What about that "shake your bon-bon" song?"

"Why the hell are we still listening?" Lora asked.

"I don't know. Where's your Eva soundtrack?" Zach hunted through the glove compartment.

"You think that my car has a CD player?"

"I guess not." It was a 1988 Colt station wagon. With a superdeformed Umi from Rayearth etched into the dash.

"Oh, god, it's too late." Zach attacked the radio control as he heard the fateful words, but he wasn't fast enough.

INSIDE, UPSIDE DOWN! LIVIN' LA VIDA LOCA!

"AAAAAA!"

"AAAAAAAAAAA!"

"Cool!"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"

She'll push and pull you down, livin' la vida loca!

Her lips are devil red and her skin's the color of bzzzt

- the all-oldies station. All oldies, all of the time, except for these damn commercials. Do you have chronic migraines? -

"I'm getting one now," Zach muttered, switching the channels frantically.

I could never be your woman, I could never be your woman, I could never be your woman, I could never be your woman -

"We get the point already. Change the channel," said Amelia, hands over her ears.

- If I could save time in a bottle -

bzzt

- This is "Car Talk!" Our next caller -

"Dammit! The alternative station, how hard can it be to find the alternative station?" Zach pounded the controls and tapped them some more.

Near, far, wherever you are, I believe that the heart does go on -

bzzt

This is z 100.5. All alternative. z 100.5

"YES! I've found it. At last! Took me long enough, but - "

"Zach, Zach..."

He lowered his arms. "What?"

"Your house."

"AAAAAAGH!"

His head hit the dash with a sickening thud.


Zach threw himself onto the couch and tried to decide what to do with his afternoon.

"Stare at the TV, stare at the ceiling, stare at the wall, stare at anime, stare at the floor, or sleep," he listed.

The choice was not his to make: he fell asleep.


Ring.

Ring.

Ring.

"Is he picking up?"

"No."

Lora listened to the ring a little longer and then hung up.

"Zel," she confirmed, turning to her two friends.

Amelia was turning the tape over and over in her hands, rubbing it against her skin, shaking it and listening, and even smelling it. "It's so beautiful."

"It's a tape casing with a blurry picture from the last tape, an irrelevant, insulting back blurb, and you got the dub," Lora corrected. "Now, Zel or what?"

"He's probably asleep or something," said Gary. "He didn't take a nap in English, like I do."

"It's still rude of him to not show up."

"So what do we do?"

Lora grinned evilly. "To Zach's house."

"To Zach's house," agreed Gary.

"To Zach's house?"

"Yes. Let's wake him up. Heh. Heh. Heh."


"Hey, babe," Zach muttered, smiling in his sleep.

"You even have Zel's dreams, dammit!" yelled Lora, grasping him by his neck and pulling him rapidly in an up-and-down motion.

Zach hit the floor. "I'm nothing like him!" he yelled back. It was a frequent argument between the two of them.

"Tapey, tapey, are you okay from that rough car ride?" Amelia cooed, cradling the tape and patting its back. She looked up and attached herself to Zach instead. "Zachie, Zachie, are you okay from that tossing around Lora gave you?"

"Zachie?" said Zach in a strangled voice.

"Can we watch the tape now?" said Gary, breaking it up.

"Let's get out of here," agreed Zach a bit too quickly.

They turned off the radio in the car.


"They are!"

"They are not!"

"They are!"

"They are not!"

"Lina and Gourry are the perfect couple!," Amelia insisted.

"They are not!" said Lora.

"Hey, Zach." Lora tapped his head. "We need another opinion."

Zach had been carefully studying the complex philosophical underlyings of Zelgdiss muttering "I'm a heartless mercenary swordsman! A bit dark and mysterious maybe, but..." "What was that, Lora?"

"The couples."

"Oh, the, um, couples."

"Lina and Gourry! Say Lina and Gourry!" said Amelia.

"Lina and Zel," said Lora. "You know you agree with me.

Zach glanced helplessly at Gary. "Lina and Gourry, I guess," he said. "I never thought much about it."

"He never thought much about it! Ha!"

"Ha!"

Lora and Amelia ignored each other for a few minutes. They went back to the TV, which was just getting to the third show.

"You know, Slayers Universe bills this as 'one of the silliest episodes out there'," commented Lora to nobody in particular.

They watched for awhile.

"I believe it," said Gary.


"Want to go and get a pizza?"

Everyone was still giggling. Zach waited a minute.

"Want to go and get a pizza?"

They kept giggling.

"FOOD!" he shouted in Gary's ear.

"Right, we get it. Are you paying?"

"Um...do I have a choice?"

"No."

"Fine, then, I'll pay." Zach sighed and mentally, although he would never tell his friends even under torture, recited a few lines from "More Than Words".


"Pepperoni," said Lora dangerously.

"Supreme," countered Zach.

Their eyes were fixed. They grappled, locked in hopeless battle...

Lora was coming dangerously close to winning the arm-wrestling match for pizza choice.

The waiter waited impatiently. He knew them at school; this wouldn't be much of a tip either.

Dramatic background music played. Amelia's portable CD player was on full blast, the tinny sound from the earphones obviously recognizable as Gourry's first-season theme.

"Come on, Zach." Gary abruptly broke into song. "You've got to be manly - "

"Man-lee!" Amelia backed him up.

"I hate that Daria!" said Zach, just as Lora and pepperoni won out. "Damn!"

"So, what do you think of the dub job on tape 5?" asked Gary once the waiter had gone (cursing his employment all the way).

"Lisa Ortiz was awful as always," said Lora.

"I dunno, I kind of liked her delivery on some stuff," said Amelia. "Lots of shouting in those shows anyway, so her unique style paid off."

"Was that sarcasm?" said Zach sarcastically.

"You know who was really cool? Crispin-sama," Amelia said happily. "He was so deep and sexy in the tennis show..."

"Especially when Zel was in drag," Lora interrupted.

"I don't know what problem you all have with the dub," said Gary, without thinking. "You don't have to read the bottom of the screen all of the time."

"You're ignoring the fact that we're Slayers fans and think that slapstick is funny," said Amelia, a split second before Gary got whacked by both Zach and Lora at once.

"Where's that damn pizza?" he muttered, sinking his head onto the table again.

"What about episode ratings?" Amelia continued.

"Better than most of the unfunny, undramatic crap that NEXT has been tossing at us," said Zach, looking hungrily at his napkin, his own hand, and the other patrons in a desperate attempt at finding something edible.

"Unfunny? What about the dragon fishing show?"

"Unfunny," said Zach firmly.

"You just don't like it when your Zel-kun is embarrassed," Lora accused.

"I do not! I mean....I do. I mean - "

"Yes, Zach, what do you mean?"

"Large pepperoni pizza?" The waiter was finally back.

"It's mine," said Gary. "The others are ready to order now.

"Excuse me?," said Zach threateningly.

"Amelia, why did you buy him that CD?" Lora was in pain.


That night, Amelia was rewatching her tape 5 again.

For the thousanth time, she winced at the sound of Xelloss' dub voice. "How un-Xelloss-like can a human being sound?"


Zach slotted a last tape into its hole on the shelf. There! That was one alphabetized anime collection! He sighed with pleasure.

"Still," he said to himself, "I don't know whether "8 Man" goes under e or before the letters, since it starts with a number."


Gary snored away in his bedroom.


Lora stared at the ceiling, trying to get to sleep.


"Ow!"

"Hey!"

Zach sat up. "What the hell?"

They stared around them at the woods.

Amelia rubbed her head. "How did we get here?"

Lora looked at the woods. She looked at Gary. She looked at Zach. She looked at Amelia. She looked at Zach again.

"Whoo hoo!"

"What?" asked Zach defensively.

Lora turned to Amelia.

"Zel?" she asked triumphantly.

"Zel!" Amelia agreed.

Zach looked down at himself. "I don't usually wear this much beige. Hey, what's this?" He was looking at his hand. After gawking at it for an extended period of time, he moved on to exploring his face. Lifting a hand to his hair, he felt the wires.

"I'm Zel," he said flatly.

"You always were."

"Shut up, Lora."

"She means, shut up Lina!" said Amelia happily. She made her eyes into upside-down U's.

"How did you do that?" asked Gary incredulously.

"I don't know. I just can. Hey, how did you get your tooth to gleam?"

"My tooth gleamed? Awesome! Anybody got a mirror?"

Lora patted herself down for a mirror. "No, she said mournfully. "Wearing happy pink sorceress outfit. Will sink into ground and die now."

"You get to be Lina," said Amelia. "I only get Ameria. I say it's a fair trade for wearing the outfit that now you sound like Megumi Hayashibara and you can - "

She clapped her hand over her mouth, but not in time for the evil grin to come to Lora's face. "Oh, crap."

"Power beyond the twilight
and crimson blood that flows
Buried in the stream of time
is where your power grows
I pledge myself to conquer all the foes who stand
Against the mighty gift bestowed in my unworthy hand
DRAGON SLAVE!"

said Lora.

Nothing happened.

Finally, Zach said "You used the stupid dub Dragon Slave. Use the real one. That'll work." He smiled as both Gary and Amelia whacked him on the head. "Sorry guys, doesn't hurt a bit."

"Darkness beyond twilight, crimson beyond blood that flows. In thy great name I pledge myself to darkness. I call upon thee! Pledge myself to thee! Let the fools who stand before me be destroyed by the power you and I possess! DRAGON SLAVE!"

When the woods were gone, Gary asked, "How did you get that cool background music to go?"

"I don't know, but anyway, I feel much better now."


They walked.

"What is that piece?" asked Zach, referring to the moody background music.

"It's from the TRY BGM 1, track 21, part two," recited Amelia.

"What's it called?"

"I took French, how should I know?"

"Really? That's an interesting title," said Gary absently.

Lora whacked him.

"Sorry," she explained to a surprised trio of friends, "I just got this incredible, you know, urge to do that."

Gary drew his sword. "Aren't these cool, Zach?"

Zach drew his own sword and admired the play of the dim sunlight on the blade. "Yeah. Do you have the Hikari no Ken?"

"Hikari yo! Oh, sorry."

"I guess you do," said Zach.

"Doesn't go along with TRY," pointed out Amelia.

"But Gourry, I mean, Gary, isn't a character without it. Right, Mr. Bunny?," said Lora.

"Stop calling me Gourry!"

"Stop calling me Mr. Bunny!"

"Fine, Mr. Zelga-bunny."

"Stop calling me any variation of either Zelgadiss or Mr. Bunny!"

"Fine, um..." Lora was stuck thinking of a new name for Zach.


"I'm tired," announced Amelia.

"It seems to be getting dark," added Gary.

"Would you stop stating the obvious?" snapped Zach.

"Would you stop talking like an eighteenth-century Englishman?"

"That's just the way Software Sculptors translated me in the first season. What? What did I just say?"

"Why should I care, you little - "

"Stop!" Amelia found herself climbing into Zach's shoulders. "You two have to agree! It's unjust for - "

Her face suddenly got red. "What was I saying?"

"Geez, Ameria, you haven't done something like that since the middle of the first season," said Lora.

"That's Amelia! With an l!"

"Sure, sure."

"Anyway, it's dark." Gary had something of a one-track mind, even when he wasn't being a blond swordsman.

"Where do the Slayers sleep?" asked Zel, I mean Zach.

"In inns," replied Lora.

Amelia frowned. "Not always. In tape 2 of the first season Lina and Zel slept on a rock, and in tape 3 Lina and Gourry slept under a tree. In tape 7, they slept in a burnt-out building. At the end of NEXT Lina slept in midair. In TRY episode six, they were about to sleep in the sand, and in fifteen Lina wakes up on the b - aagh!"

"You watch too much Slayers!" Zach told her. "You should get a life! Besides, you missed NEXT tape 2 where Zel and Ameria sleep in cocoons."

"Will you two just shut up? We'll find an inn."


Zach drew his sword. He felt very, very cool.

"So, Lora, you choose to defy me?"

Lora looked him right in the eyes, or rather, in his visible eye. "Yes. We're staying at the inn. I refuse to sleep in the woods, period, no matter what the price is."

"And now, we learn the answer to the ultimate question," said Amelia to Gary. "Whether Lina or Zel would win in a fair fight."

"Do you want to bet?"

"Sure. Five bucks on Lora."

"I wanted to bet on Lora too!"

"Too bad, sucker. I got to her first."

"Will you guys just shut up?" snapped Zach, his eye twitching.

"Fireball!" agreed Lora.

"YEOW!"

After a few minutes, Amelia poked Zach with her toe. "You okay?"

"Ngh."

"Now we know whether Lina's humorous fireballs hurt!"

Zach jumped up. "You're all against me!"

"Yes," Gary placidly agreed.

"Aagh." Zach slapped his forehead and passed out.

"Zel?" said Lora.

"Zel," agreed Amelia.


In the inn that night, Zach was pouring caffeine down his throat.

"What do you guys want to do here in the Slayers world?" asked Gary excitedly.

"I want to see Saillune!" said Amelia.

Zach shook his head. "Every time they go to Saillune, there's a long and not entirely interesting filler plotline. We should skip it."

"Sairaag?" asked Gary. "It's supposed to be pretty there."

"Always gets blown up. No," said Lora.

"Why don't we hitch a ride and go to one of the other continents?" suggested Zach.

He was immediately hit by a variety of thrown projectiles. "Do you want to starve on a boat for a week?" said Gary.

"I guess not. What do you want to do, Lora?"

"I want to go to Zefilia. You know, home?"

"You want to go home? Then why not back to reality?" asked Amelia.

"Who needs reality?"

"Um...us?" asked Gary. He ducked, but wasn't hit by anything.

"Let's sleep on it," suggested Amelia. "Maybe one of us will think of something we all want during the night.

"Sure."

"Okay."

"What?"

"Sleep, Gary."

"I was sleeping."


That night, Zach put on his green pajamas with the stars, tucked his sword into bed, sang a little lullaby to it, and hopped in himself.


Lora brushed out her hair and considered going after some bandits, but she was too tired. She put her head down on the dresser.


Gary lay in bed and snored. Some things never changed.


Amelia folded her clothes and put on her pink pajamas. Clutching her Zelgadiss plushy, she lay down in bed.


The next morning, Zach woke up as usual. The first thing he realized was that his newly alphabetized anime collection was next to him on the floor. The second was that he could see out of both eyes.

"Hey," he muttered, "I'm home. Weird dream. Sore. Tired. Back to sleep."


At school that day, they met for lunch as usual.

"Hi, guys," said Gary, arriving last as always. They were eating. Zach was strumming his guitar. "How was your first four periods?"

They threw trash at him.

"Bad, eh?"

"I hate math," announced Zach.

"Oh, well. A year and a half more, right?"

"I guess so. Until college, anyway," said Zach gloomily.

"Hey, Zach, it isn't so bad. We can get through it." Amelia looked up and broke into song. "I get by with a little help from my friends - "

"Ooh, I get high with a little help from my friends - " Gary put in. They gave him funny looks. "It's just how the song goes."

"I watch Slayers TRY with a little help from my friends," Lora ad libbed. "Keep it up, guys."

"Do you need anybody? Just to watch anime with. Could it be anybody?" Gary tapped a pencil on the stairs. "What rhymes with with?"

"We get the idea," said Zach.

"Look, you got him to smile," said Lora.

Zach covered his mouth. "I am not smiling."

"Zel?" said Lora.

"Zel," said Amelia.

"Hmph." Zach turned on his Daria soundtrack again.

La la la la, la la la la...


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