Jack
Turns out, being resurrected hurts like a bitch. If I could describe it, I'd say it's like trying to squeeze yourself through a hole you're too small for... and I mean really too small, think 2 inches.
When the pain finally subsided enough that I could think again, I sat up and groaned.
"Oh good!" I recognized Bunny's voice," you're u- ohhhhhhh... uh..." that sounds bad.
"What?," I asked," What happened? Do I look like a zombie? Ace said we might come back as zombies?!-"
"No that ain't it mate, but uh..." he pushed something into my hands," don't- don't freak out."
I rubbed my eyes and opened them, once they adjusted to the light I opened them to see myself... only my hair and eyes were brown. I moved the mirror around in my hands to make sure this wasn't some kind of messed up prank, but nope, either which way I turned it my reflection stayed the same.
I choked out a small laugh and turned to Bunnymund.
"It- it worked!"
"Jack?!" I whirled around to see Ace jogging towards me," Oh good! You're ok- I mean not that I was worried I wasn't worried but- oh wow man, your hair!"
I blinked to make sure nothing was wrong with my eyes, because honestly with everything that had happened in the past few minutes that would make the most sense. Ace looked... different.
"Ace!" I choked out," that- that's you right?" I felt like smacking myself, that was the first thing that fell out of my mouth and it was stupid. Ace gave me the most "what in the fuck is wrong with you?" look, yep that's her alright.
"Why wouldn't it be? Did you come back with brain damage?" I didn't have to look to know that Bunny was just trying not to lose it somewhere behind me.
North thankfully interrupted us both before I made myself sound even more stupid, and believe me, I would've found a way.
"Acenath, Jack, time for some strategy planning before we send you out!" he waved us both into his office. Ace gave me a final weird look before turning her back to me and following North. I took what felt like my first real breath since waking up, Ace was different, it was like someone had turned the brightness up on her entire face, her skin had more color, her eyes managed to shine even brighter than before, and her hair was more even and less jagged. I don't know if it was part of being alive or the changes made to her when she came back, but she looked... amazing.
And now that I had a heartbeat again it felt like it was beating out of my chest, but that was probably from all the excitement...Right.
Right?
"Ok, you two," North began," the plan is for you both to go undercover in New York City, there will be a fundraiser on Christmas Eve to help fund a treatment and vaccine for the Cruel Virus, Bran Snow will be in the city helping plan for the venue, as we have discussed, you will both go undercover and try to find out if he is Pestilence. Now," he passed us both plain, black wallets," these will be all you need to convince any security who you are."
I opened it up, but where there should be the driver's license there was just a blank piece of paper. Ace held it up to North and pointed at it.
"Thank you for asking!," he said, even though she... didn't say anything," Those are both infused with magic, hypnotism in fact, one look and it will fool any human into believing what you want. It will also be the way you'll both be able to pay for your food, your clothing-"
"Isn't that kind of messed up?" I asked, tentatively.
"Eh, we'll deal with the ethics later," North waved it off.
"So, according to these, who are we?" Ace asked.
"You are Mr. and Mrs. Overland, you're husband and wife college students studying virology at- what?"
"What do you mean WHAT?" I fired back.
"Why... THE FUCK... Are we married?" Ace asked.
"Because, why else would you both be following each other around all the time?! It would look suspicious otherwise!" North said, as if it were the most logical thing in the world," As I was saying, you'll be graduate students studying virology at Yale University, you need to study and follow Bran Snow around to gain your Masters degrees. For the week and a half you are human, you'll also be staying at the Four Seasons hotel, remember, you need to both give off a very professional appearance, you should act like you come from money-"
"Oh great," I muttered," we're snobby hipsters." Ace snickered.
"Hipsters? No. Snobby... eh, slightly. Any other questions?"
Ace raised her hand.
"Is there any way Jack and I can divorce?" she asked.
"No, any other questions?"
"I think we could've passed for brother and sister-" I tried to say but North just shushed me.
"Brother and sister, acting like you do? Too many questions, too much attention. You need to blend in, be human."
North led us both out of his office to the globe again, Sandy, Tooth and Bunny were there to see us off.
"Good luck, guys!" Tooth said, as North tossed the snowglobe to reveal a very icy looking New York City.
"We'll be checking up on ya both to gather information," Bunny said," so make sure you don't get too comfortable with each other." did he just give me a wink?!
"See you soon!" North said and gave us a push through the portal, depositing us in an alley.
Together. In our regular clothes. In what was single digit weather.
"... Jack?" Ace asked.
"Yes?"
"I'm really cold." I looked down at my bare feet and then at her.
"Remember what you said when we met?," I asked, through chattering teeth," Well, they are cold now." Ace laughed sarcastically.
"Ok, first order of business as humans, find clothes."
That ended up not being too difficult, North had dropped us off around some shops so we both decided on one that seemed to cater to young adults. Only thing was Ace thought me not having shoes would draw too much attention to us, so she convinced me to put two boxes of tissues she dug out of a dumpster on my feet before we went in. Weird thing is I don't even know which would've looked stranger to the shop people. But it's New York right? It's supposed to be odd.
"Oh god," Ace whispered to me," where do we start?" I looked around tentatively, it seemed to be pretty split down the middle, with women's things on one side of the store and men's on the other. The thing is though, how were we supposed to dress for this?
"You, uh, you grab some regular shirts and jeans and a couple coats, I'll grab the same, and some shoes, then we'll head to the dressing rooms and make sure we didn't choose anything that makes us look ridiculous. That work?" Ace nodded and we both set off.
My part was actually rather easy, I chose a few shirts that I thought would look fairly good on me as well as some jeans, and a pair of shoes that said "Converse All Star" on the side, turns out I have some big feet. Ace though... that poor girl. She had skirts, dresses, jeans, tights, and mixes of all of those to choose from, all in confusing as hell sizes. I could hear her grunting behind the door of the changing room as she tried one of each of those things on.
"Why, why, WHY?" she yelled before tossing a pair of jeans over the door at me.
"What's wrong now?" I asked.
"Those are a size 1, but they're too small, but I have two other different pairs here that are ALSO a size 1, and now these pants that are a size 3 fit like the size 1's! How do they decide on sizing women's jeans?! Black magic?!- Don't you laugh at me Frost." she said in response to my chuckling.
"Don't you mean Overland, Mrs. Overland?" I teased.
"Don't call yourself Mrs. Overland, that's weird."
"That's not- I mean, never mind," I rolled my eyes, it was silent for a while after that. But I had a nagging question in the back of my mind that I couldn't help but ask," Hey Ace?"
"What?"
"Did, um," this was embarrassing," did you do something different with your hair before I woke up?" she must have paused because I couldn't hear the clothes shuffling from behind the door anymore. I could practically feel her green eyes boring into my skull.
"Yeah... actually. Well not me, I didn't do it, Tooth offered to give me a trim to even out my hair some and make it look less like a rat's nest, she said if I looked haggard it'd draw some bad attention... Does- does it look nice?"
'You look more than nice' flitted across my thoughts briefly, but I didn't want to die so of course I didn't say that.
"Yeah, you look-" Ace chose that moment to open the door and show me what she was wearing. She had on a pair of faded red jeans, her boots over them, a black t-shirt with a strange yellow face on it, and a dark grey bomber jacket. It felt like my heart skipped a beat, even though it was so simple she looked... correct? I couldn't think of the right word for it.
"What do you think? I'm gonna wear this out," she asked, doing a twirl for me," the shirt is Nirvana, I remember that band from the early 90's because it rains a lot in Seattle, I saw a few of their shows. I know it's the 2000's now but it's not too out of place right?" she was practically beaming, I could see the shine in her eyes.
Yes, THAT was the word I was looking for. Happy, Ace just looked happy. I smiled.
"Fantastic," I answered," you look fantastic." Ace looked away, and I swore I saw her cheeks turn a bit red, but before I could make fun of her for it she pointed at me.
"So you're gonna wear that out, huh?" I looked down at my outfit and back at her.
"What? What's wrong with it? I'm wearing jeans and a shirt like you-"
"You're all in black, did someone die? Are you mourning yourself?" she snickered as we gathered the rest of our clothes and walked to the register. Ace and I flicked our blank wallets at the cashier, it worked thankfully, my exit plan if it didn't was to just book it and hope for the best.
"No I am not in mourning for myself," I answered back," I just like it. I thought it looked cool." I pointed finger guns at her and winked for effect, all it got me was a punch to the shoulder. Ow.
"You're a nerd. North told me he'd drop us off near the hotel, I think it's down this way, c'mon." She waved at me to follow her as she walked down the street towards a high tower with four flags hanging from the outside.
"You didn't even get my pun!" I said, jogging to catch up.
The minute I stepped inside the hotel lobby my jaw dropped. It was incredibly swanky, a giant Christmas tree sat in the middle of a gigantic hallway that looked like it had been sculpted out of marble and gold, to our left was a dining area complete with a bar, to our right was the front desk, and straight ahead past the tree was a staircase that branched off to either side.
"Wow." I breathed.
"The guardians really pulled out all the stops for us, huh?" Ace whispered to me, all I could do was nod back.
"Let's check in."
"Mhmm."
Together we walked up to the lady at the front desk and I flashed her the wallet.
"Uh, check in for Fr-," Ace stomped on my foot," AH- OVERLAND, Overland sorry, haha, Overland!"
The lady didn't seem to notice, and typed our info into the computer.
"Ah yes! Mr. and Mrs. Overland," I bit the inside of my lip- godammit North!," we have the penthouse suite reserved for you and your wife for the next few days, here are your guys's room keys, we here at the hotel hope you have a wonderful stay!" she smiled at us and handed us a little paper sleeve with two plastic cards inside.
Suite? Wait, what?
"Wonderful!," Ace said,taking the sleeve," Thank you ma'am, c'mon husband." she grabbed hold of my arm and turned me around with her.
"Penthouse suite?!" I half screamed to Ace when we made it into the elevator and out of earshot from anyone.
"I know! It's awesome!," Ace said, beaming from ear to ear," We gotta thank them somehow for this-"
"But what about not attracting attention? Two people in a suite for a college research project is a little much isn't it?" Ace squinted her eyes a bit in that way she always does whenever she thinks hard about a problem, it made me smile a bit.
"Well we're supposed to have money right? We'll say... your parents work with that fruit company. What's it called?" I gave her a look.
"Do you mean Apple? Apple computers?" the elevator dinged as it reached our floor at the top.
"And how did you get to be so tech literate?" she asked, crossing her arms, I smirked at her.
"Since one of my believers is an 8 year old boy in the 21st century." she shrugged, I slid the room key into the lock and opened the door.
And again. Wow.
I thought the lobby was fancy, our room nearly blew it out of the water. Couches were centered around a fireplace with a large TV above the mantel, a chandelier hung down from the ceiling in front of what I immediately fell in love with, an almost floor to ceiling window with a view of the New York skyline at night. Looking over it reminded me of flying, and I smiled.
"Hey Jack?"
"Yes?" I answered back.
"There's only one bed."
Hey everyone! Sorry for the long wait, I went on vacation in the summer and I came back with not only the flu, but also a UTI, and then I needed to get the paperwork done for the last class I'm taking this semester before I'm done with school! Whoo!
But that's done, anyway, R&R, thanks guys!