Disclaimer: I do not own Buffy the Vampire Slayer, it belongs to Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, Warner Bros, etc.
* * * *"We've got a rhythm!"
"Pulse?"
"Strong at 120."
"Blood pressure is at 100."
"Alright, give it four units of 0 neg. Hang two on the rapid infuser."
Xander found himself staring up at a row of fluorescent lights. He was dimly aware of people hurrying around him and the beep of a heart monitor.
"Cameron?"
Suddenly there was a man towering over him, blocking out the row of lights.
"Cameron, can you hear me?" The man asked, shining a light into his eyes.
He nodded slowly.
"I'm Dr. Malcolm, you're at Northwestern Memorial Hospital. You're going to be okay. Lana, here," he said pointing to a short and stern looking woman attaching some red bags to the IV stand next to him, "is taking you upstairs to a room. Is there anyone we should contact? Anyone we should call?"
"Dr. Malcolm, the medivac is landing right now."
The voice came from his left, but Xander found he was too weak to turn towards it. He felt lightheaded and found it hard to focus on the activity happening around him.
"Alright, I'm on my way." Dr. Malcom said. He looked up at Lana and nodded at her before turning and leaving.
"I'll take care of you," Lana said smiling as she pushed his bed out of the emergency room, down the hall and into an elevator. "You know you're very lucky, for a minute there we thought we'd lost you."
Lana hit a button for an upper floor and Xander closed his eyes for a moment, trying to collect his thoughts. It seemed like every time he managed to get a hold of one it slipped through is fingers. There was something very important he had to do, but he couldn't remember what.
There was a faint ding as the elevator doors opened and the nurse wheeled him out onto another floor. He opened his eyes and watched as calm beige walls floated past.
He closed his eyes again, for what he thought was just a second, and when he opened them again he was in a hospital room. Lana was injecting something into his IV line while talking to another nurse. She stopped abruptly when she realized he was awake.
"It's okay," she said, "I've just given you something to help you rest. It's going to take a while for your body to recover."
"Do they know what happened?" whispered the other nurse as Lana stepped back towards her.
Lana shook her head and glanced back towards Xander.
Xander blinked, trying vainly to keep his heavy eyes open, but once his eyes were closed, he found himself unable to open them again. After a few moments of struggling against the darkness it overpowered him.
* * * *Xander opened his eyes and saw the second nurse placing a tray of food on the table by his bed.
"Good Morning," the nurse said giving him a kind smile. "Feeling up to a little lunch?"
He looked at the tray in front of him as she pulled the lid off revealing some kind of meat and gravy combo and a generous helping of green Jello.
"No thanks," he said, looking away from the tray. Just the thought of food was making him feel nauseous.
"Alright," she said. "I'm going to finish getting lunch to the other patients and then I'll be back to check that bandage, okay?"
"Okay," he said, watching as she disappeared out of the room. Once again he glanced at the tray of food beside his table and then turned his head away from it to stare out the window.
It looked like a beautiful day outside. Sunny and bright and…
Did she say bandage?
He looked down quickly, wondering what kind of damage would involve a bandage. Why wasn't it a surprise that the PTBs had given him damaged goods to work with? It seemed like he was always being dealt a short hand.
Oh, God, what if he had short hands? He held his hands out in front of him, but they looked like his own.
He moved them nearer, inspecting them carefully.
Wait a minute, these were his hands. There, on his right hand was the burn mark from an omlette gone bad, and there on his left was the scar that had come from him slicing his hand open when he, Willow and Jesse had gotten the bright idea of becoming blood brothers back in fourth grade. But hadn't Cordelia told him he'd be coming back as someone else?
He looked around the room for a mirror, but didn't see one. Figuring there must be one in the bathroom; he pulled the covers back and moved his legs so that they were hanging over the edge of the bed. They were definitely the same legs he'd woken up with every morning of his twenty three year old life.
He reached out and grabbed the side of the bed firmly with his right hand. A flash of white caught his eye and he looked at the hospital ID bracelet that was sliding up and down his arm. "Cameron Spencer," he read off of it. "What kind of a name is Cameron?"
"What kind of a name is Laville?"
The voice startled him and this time he had to grab the side of the bed to stop himself from falling off of it. He spun around to see Cordelia standing on the opposite side of the bed looking critically at the hospital food.
"Great job, Cordelia," he said, putting one knee back up on the bed so that he could twist to see her better. "What better place to give me a heart attack than a hospital."
"What I don't get is the deal with all the Jello. The way hospitals mass produce it you'd think it had mystical healing properties. It's just colored powder and water, people. I don't need a PhD to tell you that."
"Why don't you tell me who I am?" Xander asked, jiggling the ID bracelet at her.
"You said it yourself, you're Cameron Spencer," she said glancing at the bracelet. "And after years of living on the Hellmouth and then working for a vampire, I'd say that by the look of that bandage on your neck you were vamp food."
Xander reached up and felt the gauze on his neck. His fingers fumbled with the tape and peeled it off. He looked up at Cordelia and she nodded in confirmation. "Yep, ironic isn't it?"
"Thanks for the input, Alanis," Xander said, putting his feet shakily on the ground. "I need a mirror."
"Why do you want to put yourself through that kind of punishment?" Cordelia asked giving him a small smile.
"Why?" Xander asked stopping at the foot of his bed. "Is this Cameron guy ugly? How ugly are we talking? Good personality ugly or dog ugly?"
"I was talking about you," Cordelia said rolling her eyes. "I don't see him, I see you."
"So I see me, and you see me, but everyone else sees him?"
"Basically. Now hurry up and get dressed, you've got business to attend to and I hate hospitals."
"Wait, I want to see myself first," Xander said continuing on his way to the bathroom.
Cordelia gave an exasperated sigh. "Fine, suit yourself, but remember beggars can't be choosers. You were put into the first available body, so it probably isn't Brad Pitt or anything."
"What are you doing out of bed?"
Xander, only a few feet away from the bathroom, looked up to see the nurse standing in the doorway.
"Busted," Cordelia said, sitting in an empty chair and crossing her arms.
"I wanted to see something," he said, pointing to the bathroom.
"Not yet," the nurse chided, as she forcefully steered him back to the bed. You are supposed to be resting. You don't recover from loosing that much blood overnight. Look, you pulled out your IV."
"I just wanted to look in the mirror," Xander pleaded. "Just for a second."
The nurse shook her head. "Maybe later, right now you just need to relax. I see that you took off your bandage also, you can't be doing that if you want it to heal correctly."
She examined his neck closely. "Well, I don't think it will leave very much of a scar. Do you know who or what did this to you?"
Xander shook his head. "No, I don't." She cut off another piece of gauze and placed it on his neck. "Can you just tell me if I'm ugly? You can be honest."
Cordelia shook her head, but gave him a small grin. "Xander, when did you get so vain?"
"I just want to know what I have to work with," he said defensively.
"Ugly?" she asked, giving him a chuckle. "No, you're not ugly. You're actually…"
"Hello Cameron," said a man wearing a white coat as he entered the room. "How are you feeling today."
"Doctor, I was just changing the bandage," he nurse said standing up. "I'll let you finish the examination though."
"Thank you, Martha," he said, picking up Xander's chart. "Well, looks like you had quite a bit of excitement, didn't you, Cameron?"
"You could say that," he said, as Cordelia stood up and read the chart over the doctor's shoulder.
"Okay, your name is Cameron Spencer, you live in Chicago, you're twenty years old and…oh boy," she said looking up at him. Her eyes wide.
"What?" Xander asked, sitting up.
The doctor looked up from the chart. "I didn't say anything."
"Hold on," Cordelia said as she held up a hand and continued to read.
Xander fell back on his pillow. "Just tell me. It can't be any worse than dying, right?"
"Do you remember that?" the doctor asked with excitement in his voice. "Do you remember dying?"
Xander gave him a puzzled look.
"I've always been fascinated, that's all," the doctor hurried ahead. "I've had patients that report seeing a bright light or a loved one, is that what you saw?"
Xander chuckled, "Actually, mine had track lighting and an ex-girlfriend."
"Track lighting? Ex-girlfriend? Are you sure?" the doctor asked, looking disappointed. "I've never quite gotten that response."
"Xander, you're not going to believe this," Cordelia said, shaking her head and meeting his eyes.
"Well, you should be able to leave by tomorrow," the doctor said, closing the chart and replacing it at the end of his bed. "Is there anyone we should contact for your release?"
"Giles," Xander said. "Rupert Giles."
"Xander, they can't know who you are," Cordelia said. "Not that they'd recognize you."
"Okay, I'll get one of the nurses to look him up tonight."
"I'm not going to tell him who I am. I just need his help." Xander said, giving Cordelia an annoyed look.
"So he's not family? Well that shouldn't be a problem, you're old enough to sign yourself out."
"How are you going to talk him into helping you? You can't just show up and expect him to reveal Council secrets to you. If we're going to work on finding out who is murdering the potentials we're going to have to do it on your own."
"You bet your ass I can," Xander said stubbornly, "I am going to do this on my own, I just need his help in getting started."
The doctor gave him a kind smile. "Of course. You're a very lucky woman, Cameron. You've got a second chance at life, don't waste it."
"Thanks," Xander said, giving him a smile. "I wo---whoa...what did you just say?"
"You've got a second chance at life, don't waste it."
"Before that."
"You're a very lucky woman?" the doctor repeated unsurely.
He sat up so fast it made him feel dizzy. "Woman?"
"Are you alright?" The doctor asked stepping back towards the bed.
Xander turned towards Cordelia. "Woman!"
Cordelia nodded. "Yeah, looks like it. Well, I can't see it, but the chart says you are."
Xander pulled back the covers and stumbled out of bed. "This can't be right. I can't be a woman."
"Cameron…" the doctor said, laying a hand on his shoulder. "I think you should…"
Xander shrugged him off and went into the bathroom. He shut the door behind him, locking the doctor out. He switched on the light and stared at the reflection in the mirror. The reflection mocked him as it imitated the action of his hand sliding off the light switch.
He stared at the woman on the other side of the glass, a woman with auburn hair, green eyes and a look of utter shock that ordinarily he might have even laughed at. He wasn't laughing now, though.
"Oh, God," he whispered, reaching up and touching his nose and his mouth, and seeing her do the same. He reached down and touched his own smooth chest and watched in horror as she did the same, though hers was anything but smooth.
"You've been a woman for five minutes and already you're feeling yourself up," Cordelia said, shaking her head behind him. "That's so typical."
He turned towards her. "This is not typical! This is anything but typical! I'm a woman!"
"Not a bad looking woman, either. You could use some moisturizer, a good eyebrow wax…oooh and maybe some highlights and you could be a knockout."
"Cordelia," he said, struggling to keep calm. "How is this possible?"
"Well, they did say the very first body available, I guess that was her."
"But…"
"You know, the PTB's might be egotistical, but you can definitely say one thing about them." Cordelia said raising an eyebrow at him.
"They're out of their collective minds?" Xander asked, staring once again at the girl in the mirror.
Cordelia smiled. "It might be twisted, and miss it's mark half the time, but they've definitely got a sense of humor."
* * * * *
A/N: Scott Bakula in a dress. It never got old. That's all I'm going to say.
Oh, except for: Please review!