A.N.: So, this fic was written at the bequest of Underneath All Elsewhere. The ideas are mine, but it is our good friend and fellow user who suggested that I actually write this fic.

Disclaimer: The characters used herein are copyright their respective owners, the basic setting was created by Todd Greenwald, and the whole thing is owned by Disney Corporation. They also own my soul.


The television in the Russo home played softly, no one particularly watching it at the moment. Max sat on the couch, not exactly watching it, but not exactly not watching it. He took it in, passively staring at the screen, disinterested in what was on but finding nothing better on any other channel. Alex, his sister, sat at the dining room table, doing homework of some sort or another. Over by the kitchen island, his mother Theresa prepared dinner.

"Oy, mi hijo, you'll rot your brain with that stuff," she said. "Why don't you read a book?"

"But mom, I don't feel like reading. I just want to sit here," Max replied, disengaged.

"Suit yourself," Theresa said, giving up. "What's on, anyway?"

"Music videos. No interesting artists, though," Max went on, still bored.

"Oh, like who?" Alex interjected, getting bored herself, her homework wearing on her.

"Hannah Montana, Mikayla."

"Did you say Mikayla?" Justin said, coming down the steps. He bounded down, excited.

Max rolled his eyes. "A new video of hers is about to play."

"Ooh, turn it up!" Justin said. Alex, now curious, also walked over.

"That Mikayla is hot," Justin commented as he sat down.

Alex cocked an eyebrow and took the seat next to him. "You know, some people say I look just like her," she said.

"Nah, I'm not seeing it," Max said, brushing it off. Alex sighed and Justin shushed her as Mikayla appeared on the screen.

"I still say I look like her," Alex muttered under her breath. Justin either didn't hear her or was purposely ignoring her. Either way he was engrossed in the singer's beauty and talent as she belted her newest song. He didn't speak, or seem to even blink as he watched, taking in it all. When it was over he sat back, as though satisfied with a meal he had just had.

"No," Justin said, finally replying to Alex's statement. "See, she's hot, you're my little sister." Alex smirked at this. Could it possibly be that he actually thought she was pretty? This sounded like it might be a bit creepy, but it didn't have to be. Justin could admit she was beautiful without being attracted to her, which would be creepy. She doubted that he would ever, of course, call her good-looking, or indeed even think that she was good looking. Still, the fact that she looked like Mikayla – despite what Justin and Max said, she held to this belief – this should mean that if she weren't his sister, he would think she was as gorgeous as Alex knew she was. If there were some sort of test she could perform, she would in a heartbeat. That would require her no longer being his sister, or at least him not perceiving her as his sister. Of course, that in itself would require something along the lines of magic. It was fortunate that Alex was a wizard, then.

Changing someone's perceptions, altering their thoughts and changing what they fundamentally know was a very tricky thing to do. It would involve some powerful magic. The last time she recalled being able to make a massive number of people deluded was due to a genie, who were as powerful as they were malevolent. She had also heard of a memory erasing spell, which apparently erased the past few minutes from the memory of a large group of people. It was an essential spell in wizard secret keeping. (Unbeknownst to her, she had it cast on her once. But of course, she forgot it having been cast, though she did manage to figure out that something odd had happened and managed to use the situation to get a date with Riley, a cute guy she'd had her eye on. He was since forgotten, but Alex's manipulative skill only grew.) However, it was much easier to erase memory than modify it, because modifying it was essentially erasing it and replacing it with a false memory.

Replacing a true memory with a false memory... Alex considered this. What if she could replace the memory of Mikayla with Alex? And vice-versa, of course. Would that make Justin think of Alex like he does Mikayla, or make her think Alex was Mikayla? There would only be one way to find out, of course. Still, there had to be an even easier way. Replacing... what if she could replace Mikayla with Alex? Or, more specifically, switch Alex and Mikayla? She shook her head, all this thinking in the third person was beginning to confuse her.

So what if she switched places with Mikayla? That wouldn't require everyone to suddenly think she was Mikayla and again, vice-versa, not if she, say, literally switched places. It would involve simultaneously teleporting the two of them to each other's locations, and no one would be the wiser because she looked exactly like the artist. All she would have to do is dye the ends of her hair red, and then when she appeared in Mikayla's room, she would take her place and begin acting like her. Perhaps people would mention something - "Oh, you look different Mikayla," they might say – but Alex felt she could easily brush this off and pass for the singer. It wouldn't be forever, if she tried this – just long enough for her to come to New York, somehow get Justin a backstage pass, and meet him, and get him to admit she was beautiful. At least that last part should be easy to accomplish for Mikayla. And once he did, she would reveal everything – she was actually Alex. She would prove it with a hilariously embarrassing story from his past, preferably one involving a situation brought about by her. Then Justin would have to admit that not only did she look like Mikayla, but she was damn hot.

Step one was to dye her hair. So she sat quietly through dinner, and after dinner, went down to the drugstore. She knew the exact brand and shade of hair dye that Mikayla used from reading teen magazines, so she purchased it. It cost her almost a week's salary (after the IRS took most of her paycheck), but she thought it would be well worth it.

The next day, she followed the directions on the box, and used it to dye the ends of her hair, just like Mikayla's.

"What did you do to your hair, honey?" Theresa said, without the tone of disbelief and with a tone of genuine curiosity, as Alex descended the steps to show it off.

"You like it?" she said, twirling a little.

"Oh please," Justin said as he passed by. "You just did that because you think you look like Mikayla."

"I do look like Mikayla," she returned. "This just completes the ensemble."

"Whatever, I still say you don't," Justin said, going up the stairs, brushing by her slightly. Alex felt a tingle go up her spine, and she wondered what it was. She ignored it for now though, as phase one was complete. Next, she would have to find a spell to do what she wanted to do.


A.N.: So, it's short because 's setup is such that it behooves authors to write short chapters and update frequently. I'll be shooting for 1000 words per chapter, which is dreadfully short, believe me. Also, I apologize, but it doesn't seem to be up to my usual level of work. I hope I do better next chapter. Um, what do you people usually say? Read and review, that's it. Even if it's a bad review, go ahead and say it sucks.

Edit: Found a mistake or two, which I fixed.