Life was wonderful. The sky was blue, the grass was green, and the Slayers had triumphed once more. Time to party!
The group, namely Lina, Amelia, Zel, and Gourry, had gone back to the inn after a hard battle. A mage used the powers of hypnotism on a sleepy backwater town in order to become ruler of the world. Sure, that sounds like a bad idea on reflection, but hey, they did it in Blazing Saddles! Well, maybe not, but it sounded good, ne? However, little did they realise that the evil hypnotist had managed to insert some messages into their own minds during the battle...
They sat down to dinner, a large feast that could've fed twenty trolls, but only barely filled the quartet with its two bottomless pits. Lina and Gourry fought over the food, as usual, Amelia darting in now and again when her plate became involved. Zel just sat and drank his coffee, having finished with his meagre meal long ago.
"Oi, that's my turkey leg, Lina!"
"You had the last one, baka!" BASH
"ITAAAIIII!!!"
"Hmph! That's what you get for hogging my hard-earned dinner." The sorceress sat back down and chomped on her newly-won food.
Zel sighed. "Can't we sit down and eat like civilised people for once?"
Blink, blink
<(((_-))> "Never mind. I'm going to bed." He stood and made his way to the stairs, passing a set of chimes. He stopped for a moment to look at the intricate designs inlaid on each pipe, then decided to test out the sound. Hey, it was like midnight already. No one but their small group was left awake to be bothered by it.
It turned out to be a big mistake. You see, most spells of hypnosis are triggered by sound of some sort, and our happy little Dragon Slaved mage liked chimes. He had them all over his house, in fact.
Zelgadis struck the chimes with a swipe of his finger across them, sending the cheerful harmonious sound throughout the room. The others looked up suddenly at the noise, their eyes going blank. Then Lina picked up her silverware and started juggling them. Apparently, she believed she was a circus performer. She then caught the knife, fork and spoon, stood, picked up her chair and placed one foot on her chin, and started juggling her empty plates.
Gourry's and Amelia's eyes slowly raised to watch her, then just as slowly, their heads turned to face one another. These two had been instructed to believe they were a tortoise and a snail.
"Whaaaaaaat iiiiiiiiisssssss shhhhhhhheeeeeeee dooooooooiiiiiiing, Gouuuuuuuuuuuuuryyyyyyyyyyyyy-ssssssssaaaaaaaan?"
"Iiiiiiiiiit looooooooooooooooks liiiiiiiiiiiiikkkkkkkkkke shhhhhhhhhhhhheeeeeeeee'sssssssssssssss baaaaaaaaaaaaallllllllllllllaaaaaaaaannnnnnnccccccccciiiiiiiiiiiiinng thhhhhhhiiiiiinnnnngssss aaaaaaaaaaaaaaannnd ssssssssssssstuuuuuuuuuuuuuffffff," said the tortoise to the snail. "Youuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu waaaaaaaaaannaaaaaaaaa raaaaaaaaaaaaccccccccccccccce?"
"Suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuurrrrrrrrrrrrrrrre," she replied. The two crept, or in Amelia's case, slid on her stomach, out of their chairs and inched over to the door. "Fiiiiiiiiiiirrrrrrrrrrrrrrssssssssssssst oooooooooooone tooooooooooooooooo thhhhhhhheeeeee ssssssssssssstaaaaaaaaaaaiiiiiiiiiirrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrsssssssssssssss wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinnnssssss." The race began.
Zel's eyes got impossibly big as he watched Lina's juggling act, soon switching out plate-ware for toned-down Lighting balls. "Ooooooh!!!! Sugoi!" He walked over and stood next to her, awe-struck. "Wow." Our dear little chimera currently thought he was a child the age of four.
Lina started moving around, variably moving from a standing to a sitting position as she tossed the balls of light into the air. She next did a little Russian kick dance while juggling the spells, her rear almost touching the ground each time.
Zelgadis blinked innocently and giggled. A really good idea came into his head. He liked his idea a lot. So he decided to act on it. He hopped up and caught Lina's Lightings as they flew above her head and brought them down, clutching them to his chest and staring at them.
"Give me back my balls, you damn virgin!" she screeched.
<(((.O))>\> "What's a virgin?"
Lina blinked. "What? Just give me the damn balls back!" she snatched them from his grasp. "Go sharpen your sword or something, Zel; I'm busy."
"My sword?" he said to himself. The chimera looked down and sure enough, there on his belt was a sword. A pretty sword. "Pika pika!" he exclaimed, jumping up and down. He proceeded to draw the sword and swish it around in the air a few times. "Die, evil villains! Face my wrath!"
Amelia heard him and turned as she continued racing Gourry across the room. "Kiiiiiilllllllllliiiiiinnng iiiiiiiissssss wrrrrrrrrrroooooooooongggggggg, Zeeeeeeeeeeeeeeelllllllllllllllggaaaaaaaaadddddddddiiiiiiiiisssssssss-ssssssaaaaaaaann!" She was promptly ignored, the boy preferring to swipe at a statue in the corner.
"Have at ye!" he crowed, then in a deeper voice more like his regular one, he answered for the statue, "What are you talking about?" "I dunno, what do you think, Statue-san?" "Don't ask me, I'm stone, remember?"
Gourry reached the halfway point to the stairs, turned around rather quickly for a tortoise, and gave Amelia a beda face. "Youuuuuuuu woooooooonn'ttt caaaaaaaatchhhhhhh meeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!"
"Weeeeeeeeeee'llllllllllllllll sssssssssssseeeeeeeeeeeee aaaaaaabouuuuuuuuuuuuuttt thhhhhhhhhhhaaaaaattt!!!!"
Lina ascended the railing of the staircase, an empty wine bottle neck-side down balanced on her forehead. Zel followed, swinging his sword. He raced forward at the top and charged into his room. Spotting a painting of a demon (or it could just be a really wrinkly old guy; children's imagination and all that) on the wall, he jumped on the bed and slashed at it, striking the frame, cutting a large gash in the wall, hitting yet another set of chimes (wow, I guess the innkeeper likes them, too) and...
CRASH
...snapping the bed in half like a dry twig.
The redhead charged in at the noise and halted abruptly as she was met by an explosion of feathers. When the cloud of white finally dissipated, she looked at the room's lone occupant. "Zel, you broke the bed??"
"It's not my fault I weigh half a ton!"
"What were you DOING???"
The shaman blinked. "Um...I really can't remember."
She took her turn and blinked. "Funny, I can't remember how I even got up here. And what am I doing with a wine bottle in my hand? I thought Gourry had the wine, not me!"
Amelia and Gourry blinked as well. "Why am I on the floor?" the princess questioned, getting up.
"Where did Lina and Zel go?"
"I dunno. Let's go look upstairs!"
"Yosha!"
The foursome met up in Zel's room, the former tortoise and snail following the feather trail. None of them could remember what just happened.
From a tree branch outside, a lone figure sat and watched, his laughing amethyst eyes catching all the hilarity. "My, my, but that was fun!" Xelloss cheered. "Chimes. I'll have to remember that and thank that mage someday." With one more look in on the confused quartet, he phased out to tell his master about the antics.