The Switch-up

Chapter 1

It was like any normal day for Grojband. They were relaxing in Corey's garage waiting for his return wth some news on what kind of gig they would be playing. On the couch, with a bass guitar in hand, was Laney. She had been practicing her made-up basslines to become more skillful with her technique while also trying to be like her idol, Karol Clien.

"Dang it! It's always that A-flat that trips me up. I don't know how Karol does it." Laney angrily mumbled to herself.

Meanwhile, Kin and Kon were on stage. Tensions had formed between the two brothers because of a little dispute over a simple food.

"Alright, I think I finally came up with an idea on how to settle this once and for all." Kin said, looking over at Kon.

"How so?" Kon questioned.

"I think we should have a staring contest to see who gets the last cheese stick in Corey's fridge. If either of us blinks first, then the winner gets the cheese stick."

With a grand, delicious prize on the line, Kon couldn't agree more to this challenge his brother offered.

"Oh, you're on bro!"

With that, Kin and Kon began their challenge to see who would win that final cheese stick. Laney couldn't help but overhear what they were talking about and decided to watch them as their eyes battled. The challenge was getting more and more intense as the seconds ticked on by. So much so, that Laney put her bass down, watching in disbelief as her friends continued to stare at each other. The garage door suddenly opened to reveal Corey with a smile on his face.

"You guys won't believe what kind of gig I got for us today!" Corey said enthusiastically

"Let me guess. Is it a gig that is normal for once?" Laney said sarcastically.

"Let's hope so. Mayor Mellow has invited us to play for the music festival hosted here in Peaceville in honor of us from saving the world from that giant meteor."

Laney sighed in relief. She couldn't take another day with Corey's sister, Trina, trying to ruin their awesome gigs. Suddenly, yelling could be heard on the stage where Kin and Kon where having their staring contest.

"Yes! I win! I get the last cheese stick!" Kon shouted victoriously as he ran towards the fridge.

"What was that about, Kin?" Corey questioned.

"Well, my good man, Kon and I were having a staring contest to see who could get the last cheese stick in your fridge and Kon won fair and square for it."

"Oh, cool."

The room grew quiet with an unbearing urge for anything to happen. Luckily, that sort of thing happened to be a random machine tucked away in the corner of the garage. Laney had accidentally bumped into the machine causing her to loose her balance as she fell to the floor.

"Woah, Lanes! You okay?" Corey asked helping Laney up.

Laney blushed. Usually she could shrug off a simple fall like that off on her own but whenever Corey was concerned about her, it made her feel so special to him. "Uh, yeah...totally, Core"

"Sorry about that. That's one of my old inventions called "The Switch-O-Matic""

Corey looked at Kin with confusion written all over his face. " The Switch-O-what?"

"It's a machine I built that switches the ablilities of one person and gives those abilities to the other person. Kon and I tested it on some squirrels but it didn't seem to have any affect on them, so I just forgot about it until now."

Everyone seemed interested in what that machine actually did but just shrugged it off as one of his failed inventions to be put to rest with all the others.

"Well, the festival is in five hours from now so we need to get rehearsing" Corey stated.

"But we don't even have lyrics for this gig, Core!" Laney warned.

"Ah, I'll worry about that later. Let's rock Grojband!"

Laney sighed in annoyance. Even though Corey is the man of her dreams, she couldn't bare not having things going according to plan. A gig without lyrics would kill the band's reputation. With the gig today and not a whole time left, there was nothing else to do but to jam out with her friends and hope he could get those lyrics in some fashion.

After some rehearsal time, Corey grew thirsty and told the band to take five. Grabbing the lemonade out of the fridge, he passed some glasses around to his other band mates who were all spread apart in the garage. A unison of thanks followed suit. Corey noticed Kin walking over to his old invention observing it but couldn't help but feel like it was a bad idea.

"Kin, you sure you should have any drinks by your machine? I don't want anything exploding in this garage anymore."

"Oh don't worry. This thing was built to perfection until, you know, it seemed not to work."

Upon saying that, Kin had accidentally knocked the glass of lemonade over and spilled it all over the control panel causing it to overload the circuits. A bright, green light appreared above the machine that was pointing right at the whole band.

"Uh oh. This can't be good."

The machine shot a green ray at all the members. Shocked and confused, everyone patted themselves down to make sure they were okay. Kon was the first to address the situation at hand.

"Well, at least your machine didn't explode, Kin."

"True, but we don't know if this machine actually worked or if it was just some special effects." Kin said still baffled that his machine was still functioning.

"Either way, we totally gotta rehearse again before this gig everyone. We need to make sure we got this killer tune mastered." Corey remarked.

Everyone headed back on stage to rehearse their song they've been working on for the past two hours. Kon counted everyone in, but, much to everyone's dismay, they sounded awful. It's like they didn't know how to play their instruments at all.

"What the..." Corey strummed his guitar only to get an awful sound out of every chord he played. "I don't know how to play my guitar. What happened!?"

"I can't even play my bass either!" Laney added, shocked.

"Or my drums!" Kon screamed.

The band was in total shock of what happened only a few moments before them. None of them could play an instrument or even begin to comprehend on how to play in the first place. Kin seemed like the only person who knew exactly what was going on.

"Alright, guys. This might sound crazy, but what if that so-called "failed" invention that I explained earlier actually worked in that we switched our abilities around? In this case, it would be our musical abilities."

"So, you're saying that we can't play our own instruments but can play someone else's with ease?" Laney cried out.

"Precisely. We'll just have to figure out which instrument we can play by testing it out."

With that information, Corey was the first to figure out who's ability he had. First, he tried the keys with his fingers forming chords that gave an horrible sound with each hit. Second, he tried the drums. Unfortunately, it was the same result as the last one. That left the bass guitar. Laney was hesitant at first to give him her bass, but for one, it couldn't hurt seeing as he needed to figure this thing out, and seeing her crush play her instrument would be a blissful experience. Corey grabbed the bass guitar and proceeded to pluck the strings in quick succession, coming up with grooves he never thought he could ever pull off before. Laney was in total shock. She couldn't believe it. Her crush playing her one and only instrument.

"Core, you're rocking out my bass! That is so...amazing. She exclaimed, swooning over her crush.

"This is so cool! I never knew I could do that!" Corey said cheerfully.

It was now Laney's turn to figure out who's ability she had. Surprisingly, she picked up Corey's guitar and gave it one big strum. The guitar rang throughout the garage with a beautiful sound. With knowledge that she had Corey's abilities, she began to shred solos on his guitar while looking at Corey from time to time to catch his reaction.

"Woah!" The boys yelled in unison.

"Laney looks really cute playing my guitar like that" Corey thought to himself, smiling.

"So, that must mean I have Kin's ability to play the keys." Kon said realizing he and Kin were the only ones who hadn't figured this whole mess out.

It was true. Kon has received Kim's abilities to play the keys while Kin received Kon's ablilites to play the drums. With this whole mess figured out, there was still a problem.

"Glad we figured out this whole ordeal, but we still have a problem, Core. We, one: have to figure out how to play our tune while learning our new instruments and, two: need lyrics for that said tune." Laney said with a bit of panic in her tone.

"Well, Lanes, we can totally jam out to our new tune with these newfound ablities." Corey put an arm around Laney causing her to blush a darker shade of red. "Plus, you were killing it on my guitar earlier."

"You weren't so bad on my bass either" Laney said dreamily.

Corey went back up on stage and instructed each member to play the exact parts that was played during the earlier rehearsal before all of the switch up mess happened. Kin was the one to count the band in this time and the band took off on a great start to another good rehearsal. One problem solved, one to go.