Part One: This Sort of Thing Happens
All the Time
It all started on a perfectly normal day, a day like any other,
on the set of Whose Line
Is It Anyway.
Ryan Stiles sat behind Drew Carey's desk and flashed a grin at
the rest of the cast.
He was the designated 'winner' of tonight's show, and was
therefore allowed to sit
this last bit out while Drew took his place onstage...sort of
like being a designated
driver for improv, he'd decided some time ago. Staying on the
sidelines while
everyone else got to act silly.
He waved at the others, currently in the middle of a
"World's Worst" routine. Greg
and Wayne waved back in an exaggerated way, as if he was missing
out on some-
thing and they were sorry he wasn't up there with them.
Ryan just leaned back and
clasped his hands behind his head. It wasn't as much fun as
performing, but the view
from the emcee's desk had its advantages. He got to sit
back and relax...and this way,
he got to watch Colin.
He liked watching Colin. That was another thing he'd
decided some time ago. In fact,
watching Colin was one of Ryan's favorite pastimes. It was
right there behind touching
Colin, kissing Colin, and sex with Colin.
Ryan smiled again. Sex with Colin sounded pretty good right
about now. Taping was
almost over, and soon he would have the Canadian all to
himself. There were times
when he could barely keep his hands off the other man, and it was
all he could do to
keep himself from turning one of his playful on-stage kisses into
the real thing. But it
wouldn't do to have to stop filming to pry the two of them apart,
he told himself firmly
(as he had many times before). There was plenty of time for
that after the show.
Suddenly there was a loud pop from overhead. Ryan's
attention was brought back to
the present, as all action onstage came to a halt.
Something above them had begun to flicker.
"What the hell was that?" Drew said, stopping in
mid-joke and looking around in
confusion.
"Maybe one of the lights is shorting out?" offered
Greg, peering upwards and trying to
get a better look.
"That doesn't look like a short," replied Wayne, as the
flicker became brighter. He
shielded his eyes as he, too, tried to see what it was.
"It doesn't sound like a short either," said Colin,
taking a few steps backwards and
away from the overhanging electrical equipment. By now the
glare was almost
painfully bright. A buzzing, crackling sound began; and the
air was filled with a
strange, ozone-like scent.
"Folks," said Drew, addressing the audience over the
intensifying noise. "I'm sorry
about this, but I think we'd better postpone the rest of the show
until they get this thing
fixed--"
Then there was a loud bang, a blinding flash, and (for Ryan) what
felt like a massive
electrical shock as he was thrown from his chair onto the hard
studio floor.
Part Two: You Got Your Comfort in My
Hurt, You Got Your Hurt in My Comfort
Ryan Stiles, flat on his back and staring dazedly up at the
ceiling, blinked a few times
but was unable to see anything clearly. His ears were
ringing from the aftereffects of
whatever malfunction had occurred -- he was sure the studio's
entire supply of
electricity had passed through his body. He felt as if he'd
been hit by a truck. A
very big, electrically-charged truck.
"Oh my God, are you OK?" asked someone leaning over
him.
Ryan blinked again, trying to clear his vision of the residual
effects of the flash. All
he could make out was the concerned face of Drew Carey staring
down at him.
"Yeah, I think so," he rasped, surprised that he could
get any words out. "What
happened? Is Colin OK?"
"Colin?" Drew echoed, then looked over his shoulder at
the people behind him,
seemingly even more alarmed than before.
"I think we'd better take him to the hospital," said
someone who Ryan couldn't see
clearly.
"But I thought you weren't supposed to move someone who'd
been in an accident,"
protested someone else worriedly.
Drew shook his head. "I think that's only if there's
the possibility of a broken bone.
Whatever that thing did to him, I don't think anything's
broken...on him, anyway."
There were murmurs of agreement from the people Ryan still
couldn't quite see.
"It'll be easier if we take the truck...I'll go get it
started, you guys bring him out,"
said the woman who'd spoken first. Ryan saw one of the
blurred figures behind
Drew hurry away; then Drew looked back down at him.
"C'mon, buddy, we're
going to the hospital."
Ryan tried to raise himself up on an elbow, then felt several
pairs of hands reach
around and grasp his shoulders, moving him into a semi-sitting
position against
something soft. He hurt all over, but his vision was
starting to clear. "No, really, I
think I'm OK. I just got the wind knocked out of me,"
he said, rubbing his eyes.
Now that he could see and hear a little better, he realized he
was no longer on the
soundstage. He looked around blearily. "Where am
I?"
"Where am I?" Drew repeated, frowning. "You
say you're OK and then you ask
'where am I'?" He moved in closer. "Now
listen to me, mister -- you were nearly
electrocuted, you are going to the hospital," he declared
sternly, in a tone that would
accept no argument.
"Drew, can't you see he's still out of it? He doesn't
know what he's saying," said the
man behind him, sounding very worried...and very familiar.
"He's probably delirious
or in shock or something." Ryan felt hands massaging
his shoulders. "You've really
got to stop doing stuff like this, or you're going to get
yourself killed one of these days."
Ryan rubbed his eyes again and blinked away the last of the
flash, and for the first time
got a good look at his surroundings.
His mouth fell open as he looked back and forth between the
people hovering
over him.
"My God," he whispered. "How the hell did I
get here?"
Drew's expression softened and he moved to Ryan's side, as he and
the other man
prepared to carry him out to the waiting truck. He sighed and
shook his head in
affectionate exasperation. "Oswald's right,
Lewis...how many times have we warned
you not to bring anything home from DrugCo?"
Part Three: One Step Beyond the Outer
Limits of the Twilight Zone
"Drive faster, Kate; Lewis doesn't look so good."
"I'm already doing almost double the speed limit."
"Guys, we don't need to get into an accident on the way
there."
"You're right, Drew. Kate, don't drive any
faster."
"Good thinking, Oswald...Lewis, how're you doing back
there?"
"Oh, I'm fine, just fine," replied Ryan Stiles weakly,
as the speeding truck lurched
around yet another corner. He closed his eyes, wishing he
would open them and
find himself back at the studio again, instead of hurtling
through downtown Cleveland
and sandwiched between two people who by all rights shouldn't
exist.
"Lewis? Lewis? Don't pass out again, buddy, you
have to stay conscious," said
Oswald anxiously, gripping Ryan's hand.
"I haven't passed out," said Ryan slowly, still with
his eyes closed. "Or maybe I have.
Maybe I'm unconscious right now, back in the real world, and all
of this is just a
dream. Maybe when I open my eyes again I'll see Colin and
Wayne and Greg. And
Drew. Not this Drew, the other Drew. And I'll --
ouch!" he yelped, pulling his arm
away and opening his eyes to stare at the man to his right.
"What was that for?"
"I pinched you so you'd know you weren't dreaming,"
Oswald replied earnestly.
Ryan felt the edges of his mouth turn up as he rubbed his arm.
"I think that only works
if you think you're dreaming."
"Oh." Oswald sounded a little disappointed.
"But it was a good plan, though," offered Ryan, hoping
to reassure him and at the
same time wondering why it would be important to do so, for a
figment of his
imagination. He supposed it was because everything seemed
so real. Which it
couldn't be, of course. Or could it? He patted the
dark-haired man on the shoulder,
then turned to Drew. What if he wasn't imagining all
this? No, that was crazy. He
couldn't really be in the middle of a sitcom...unless it wasn't
really a sitcom. Just the
thought of that made him feel a little queasy. He gazed at
Drew warily, then reached
over and removed the other man's glasses, turning them over in
his hands. In the real
world, Drew Carey the actor had had the new laser vision
correction procedure, and
no longer needed the glasses that had become his trademark.
He still wore them
while performing, but the lenses had been replaced by clear
plastic that didn't do
anything to alter his eyesight.
Ryan held them up in front of his face while Drew looked at him,
confused. Then
he put them on.
He couldn't see anything. Or rather, he couldn't see
anything clearly.
"Whatcha doin', Lewis," said Drew gently, taking them
back. "You know I can't see
a thing without them."
Ryan just stared at him. Then he stared at Oswald, and then
at Kate's reflection in
the rear-view mirror. "Oh my God," he said, as it
finally hit him. "I think I'm really
here." He rubbed his forehead wearily.
"What was that thing I took home from
DrugCo again?"
Drew shrugged. "You said it was something new they
were working on, just back
from Research and Development. Something about a way to
solve transportation
problems."
"Transportation problems?" he repeated.
"Yeah...but all it looked like was some kind of video game
console. I don't know
what it was supposed to do, exactly, but you said that if you
could get it to work
it would revolutionize the industry."
A sinking feeling was beginning to come over Ryan.
"So...it wasn't working, and I
brought it home because I thought I might be able to fix
it?"
"Yeah," said Kate from the front seat. "You
said that if you could make it work, Mr.
Hathaway would be sure to promote you."
"And give you a raise," added Oswald.
Ryan shook his head in stunned amazement. "I can't
believe it. What was he thinking?
How could he -- I mean I -- how could I be so
stupid?" he said, catching himself
halfway through the sentence.
Oswald frowned. "Uh-oh, I think he might be starting
to hallucinate." He took Ryan's
hand again.
"Don't worry, we're almost there," assured Kate.
"We're only a few blocks away."
"If he's hallucinating, who knows how long he'll have to
stay hospitalized," murmured
Drew, with that familiar worried look on his face as they pulled
up outside the
emergency room doors.
Ryan grimaced, not even wanting to consider a lengthy hospital
stay. "No, I'm not
hallucinating -- the words just came out a little backwards,
that's all," he said quickly,
as he let them help him out of the truck. His mind was
racing. The sooner he could
prove that he -- or rather, that Lewis -- was all right, the
sooner he could get back
to Drew's and get his hands on that DrugCo machine, and try to
undo whatever the
real Lewis had done to send him here. Whatever it was, it
couldn't be that difficult
to figure out, because Lewis wasn't the smartest guy in the
world, right? Right, he
told himself firmly. If Lewis could do it, I can do it
too. How many years have I
played this character? I probably know him better than he
knows himself. Piece of
cake.
Kate was already at the sign-in desk, explaining at a mile a
minute what had
happened and that her friends were bringing her other friend
inside. Drew and
Oswald helped Ryan up to the desk, standing at either side of him
in case he
needed any more assistance. "Here he is," Kate
finished breathlessly, as her
description of the events (including those on the way to the
hospital) was
completed.
The nurse from triage came up to the group, looking over the new
patient.
"Name?" she asked.
Ryan regarded her evenly. "Lewis Kiniski."
Part Four: Recap (or, You're Not
Getting Off That Easy)
It was much later that evening when Ryan was finally pronounced
medically sound.
And it was during his time at the hospital, waiting for the
results of the blood tests and
x-rays and CATscan, that Ryan had the time to really think about
where he was and
why he was there. Even on the way back to Drew's house, the
implications were still
staggering.
It seemed that Lewis, the character he played and the man he was
currently
impersonating, had been right all along.
Ryan had been thinking about it all day. He couldn't help
it. Lewis, with his theories
on alien abductions, government conspiracies, and parallel
dimensions -- stuff straight
out of the X-Files that the show usually played for laughs -- had
actually been right
on the money with at least one of them.
Somehow, somewhere, there existed a bizarre parallel dimension
where The Drew
Carey Show was not a TV show, but an alternate reality. And
in this alternate reality,
where 'Drew Carey' worked for a department store (rather than
being a comedian
who played someone who worked for a department store), everything
else from the
show was real too. There was a real Oswald Harvey, a real
Kate O'Brian, and a real
Lewis Kiniski...who worked for a real corporation called
DrugCo. What was even
weirder was that DrugCo -- which had always been portrayed on the
TV show as an
extremely strange place, prone to things like human cloning,
inter-species crossbreeding
experiments, and the like -- now appeared to have branched out
into research on
matter transportation as well. And for some utterly
unfathomable reason, Lewis
Kiniski had decided to bring home a non-functional transporter in
an attempt to make
it work. The result of which was that he, Ryan Stiles, had
been switched for his
counterpart. The exchange had been quite complete, too --
Ryan had ended up in
Lewis's clothes, even down to the underwear.
The whole way back to Drew's, all Ryan could think about was
getting home. Aside
from the strangeness of the situation (which he could kind of
ignore if he didn't think
too much about it -- everything looked pretty much the way it did
in the real world),
he really missed Colin. He didn't care if he vanished
before the others' eyes, or if it
was with a blinding flash of light and a cloud of pink
smoke. He just wanted to get
back to Drew's and got hold of that machine. He practically
leaped out of the truck
as soon as they pulled into the driveway.
"Hey, Lewis, no hurry. I know it's Friday night, but
the doctor said you can't have
any alcohol for a while."
"Oh, no problem Drew," said Ryan, almost too
eagerly. "I just want to sit back and
relax...you know, stretch out on the sofa, watch some
TV. But you guys can drink
if you want; it won't bother me."
Kate and Oswald exchanged a significant look on the front walk.
"Wow, maybe Lewis
really did suffer permanent brain damage after all," said
Kate with an impish smile.
Ryan smirked at her, as he knew Lewis would have done. Then
they went into the
house.
Drew turned on the lights. "Hello Speedy," he
said, as the dog ran down the stairs to
greet him and his guests. But upon reaching the
newly-arrived group, the Golden
Retriever stopped dead in its tracks and cocked its head at
Ryan. Then it cautiously
approached him, sniffing inquisitively.
"Whatsa matter, Speedy?" asked Drew, kneeling down and
rubbing the dog's head.
"You're acting like you've never seen Lewis before..."
// He can tell. Oh my God, the dog can tell I'm not
Lewis-- // thought Ryan in alarm.
"Maybe you smell different after you've been
electrocuted," said Oswald.
"And speaking of which," said Drew, rising to his feet
and stepping over to the couch.
"Lewis, I don't know what you want to do with this thing,
but please get rid of it.
Take it back to DrugCo or something -- just make sure it's
someplace where it can't
hurt anyone again." He picked up the charred remains
of what at one time might have
been a highly technical piece of electronic equipment, and handed
it to Ryan.
Ryan stared numbly at the blackened piece of plastic and metal,
horrified. There was
no way this thing was going to take him anywhere.
Part Five: I Have a Cunning Plan
Ryan continued to stare helplessly at the ruined piece of
machinery in his hands.
Oswald broke the silence. "Don't worry, Lewis, you
said there was a bunch of them
back at DrugCo," he enthused, clapping the taller man on the
shoulder. "They're not
going to miss just one."
"There are...more of them?" Ryan asked, wondering if he
sounded as desperate as he
felt.
"Sure," Oswald replied. "You said nobody saw
you take this one, right? They'll never
know you broke it. Just don't say anything when you go back
in on Monday."
"Monday," Ryan repeated slowly. He could get hold
of another one of these things on
Monday, when the new work week began. Maybe he wouldn't be
trapped here after all.
Maybe he could really go home.
"Oh, thank God," he murmured, sinking down onto the
couch as the relief washed over
him. He didn't know whether to laugh or cry, but he was
glad that things were looking
a little brighter. There was still a chance this could work.
Now all he had to do was survive the weekend as Lewis.