Disclaimer: I do not own Calvin & Hobbes.
Note: Concrit is always appreciated.
L'Échange
"Caaalviiin!"
Calvin drowsily brought himself up to a sitting position, rubbing his eyes as bright light flashed in them from the window. He yawned tiredly and decided to ignore his mother until she called him again. Precious moments of his life were slipping away at an alarming speed, and he was not going to waste them at a bus stop. He was going to waste them in bed.
"Calvin, get up!"
Calvin grunted and reluctantly sat up again and threw the covers off his body. "'M comin'," he muttered, noticing an odd tone to his voice that he swore didn't used to be there. He dragged himself off the side of his soft bed and inched his way toward his dresser. He felt rather sluggish today, and upon thinking himself so, he began to spin a new tale in his mind.
Calvin has been rudely awakened by his mother, and has discovered that he has undergone a peculiar transformation during the night. He lacks limbs and seems to lack a very defined shape at first. As he oozes onto the floor, however, it is clear that he has become a—
"Calvin, for the hundredth time!"
"I'm up!" Calvin shouted, his voice fueled by irritation rather than energy. There's that abnormal tone again. Why couldn't he stay in bed for the rest of the day? It was the wrong time of year to go to school. Heck, every time of year was the wrong time of year. I wish I really were a slug. Slugs don't have to go to school.
He grabbed hold of a drawer handle and yanked it toward him. "What shall I wear today?" he hummed to himself, again hearing that tone. For goodness's sake, voice, will you just be normal? You weren't weird yesterday!
It was then that a strange feeling came over him, a feeling he hadn't noticed before, a feeling of…tallness. He knew he was short, being only a six-year-old, but he couldn't escape this tall feeling, not even by thinking short thoughts. But the biggest shock was yet to come. He glanced down at what should have been purple pajamas with black teddy bears on them.
Instead, there was a furry white chest and some black-striped orange fur around it.
It took a moment for this to register in Calvin's brain, and when it did, Calvin had some very unpleasant feelings. The first thing he said, in his brand-new voice, was, "Aaaaaah!"
After a moment spent regaining his composure, Calvin rushed over to his bed and shook the figure that was still under the covers. It looked smaller than usual…uh-oh. "Hobbes!" he shouted. "You've got to help me!"
"Calvin, for goodness's sake! I'm not going to call you again, you little devil!"
Hobbes yanked the sheets off his head, which Calvin recognized with a start. He had expected this, but it still scared him to think that his tiger was in his body now. Hobbes swung his short legs over the bed.
"…Calvin? Is that you? It looks like me." Hobbes was staring doubtfully at his former body; he slowly brought his head down to look at Calvin's body. He gaped at it, blinking rapidly for a few moments. Suddenly his head snapped up, and he fixed an intense gaze on his former face. "Did you do this?" he demanded.
"No…" Calvin looked down at his paws. "At least, I don't think I did…" He met Hobbes's gaze reluctantly, then grabbed the pajama-covered shoulders. "Quick, tell Mom you're coming!"
"I'm coming?" Hobbes looked offended, which wasn't hard to do, seeing as Calvin's face looked offended often and therefore was quite used to it. "She's your mom."
Calvin growled, not realizing that he had done so until about five seconds later. "She can't hear me! Look, just shout 'Coming!' It's not that hard. See, I'll give you a quart—damnit, why doesn't this thing have pockets?" He glared at his new fur coat, then shifted his glare up to the tiger-turned-kid. "Oh, just do it already!"
Hobbes sighed and rolled his eyes. "Coming!" he shouted at the door, then, quick as lightning, shoved his body back under the covers.
Calvin wanted to wail in despair. He wanted to curse the sky and all of its inhabitants. He wanted to scream loud enough to shatter all the windows in his house. He wanted to seize Hobbes by the neck and throttle him until he agreed. He wanted to march up to the Powers That Be and sock them a good one for switching their bodies. He wanted to take his mom by the collar of her shirt and screech in her face about this whole mess.
What he actually did was say, "Hobbes, you are in my body now, so you will get up, and you will go to"—a smile spread over his face like butter on toast—"school." Maybe the Powers That Be don't need to be socked after all. Then he gave his old body another shake to emphasize his words. "C'mon, Hobbes. Face facts. Trading bodies or minds or whatever the hell we did means trading jobs and such, and you know it."
Hobbes did not appear to care. He groaned and rolled over onto his back. "Leemeelone."
"Good for you. Now stop being so lazy and fill in for me." Calvin resisted the urge to kick Hobbes in order to preserve his body's health for about two seconds before he gave in. Hobbes received a sharp kick in the side.
"Ow!" Hobbes sat straight up, his eyes wide. He flung off the covers and leapt out of bed, not with as much grace as a tiger, but with as much accuracy and power. He hit the center of the carpet full-force, without stumbling, and Calvin was worried that anything trapped until the carpet (such as bugs that he could've used to scare Susie for life) would be killed.
"Okay, fine," he muttered, after a futile attempt to growl at Calvin. "I'll go. I'll fill in for you. I'll do all the bloody things you have to do. But"—and here Hobbes shook a fist in Calvin's face—"if you don't get this straightened out by tomorrow, then you're gonna wish you'd never been born. Capiche?"
A twinge of worry appeared in Calvin's stomach. "Yeah," he said, unconvinced that he could fix this predicament by tomorrow. "Capiche."