When will the President Take Office?

[Buff]

From what I've seen, both parties have armies of lawyers already filing suits and preparing to file suits. Every single state in play already has allegations of impropriety and counterallegations. People will claim disenfranchisement, fraud, and confusion; and, thousands of lawyers and partisan hacks are prepared to spare no expense to assure victory for their candidate.

My question is this:

What happens if the election is not resolved by the time the President-elect is supposed to take over? Could we end up without a commander-in-chief for a while? Would Bush continue to hold the office? Would someone else hold the office? Would it be vacant?

And suppose it were vacant if even for a few months -- who's in charge of the Armed Forces during that time? We're at war, after all.

I think this could be a very exciting time over the next few months. Personally, I'd love to have a constitutional crisis like that.

I know what the constitution stipulates in cases of a President not being able to fulfill his duty for whatever reason, but I'm not sure it addresses post-election confusion.

Thoughts?