(Okay, this is somthing I've wanted to do since I was a little kid... my own version of the backstories of the Oz characters, based somewhat on the various 'interperations' of Oz. This is my first Oz story, so go easy on me, ok? First up, the Tin Woodsman.)
(Oh yeah, almost forgot: Based on the 'Oz series' created by L. Frank Baum)
1.) Heartless
As he wiped the sweat from his brow, Nicolas Chopper set his ax down, and took a cool sip of water from his canteen. As one of the best lumberjacks in munchkin land, his services were in high demand. It was easy to make a paycheck in these parts- especially amongst lazy, rich munchkin farmers who didn't want to chop their own firewood, or the lumber to build their barns, sheds, and homes. Still, even greatest woodsman in Oz could stand to take a break now and then.
Reaching up and picking a lunch pail off of a nearby lunch pail tree, Nick munched on the grilled cheese sandwich it contained. Tucking his white polka dot handkerchief into his red flannel shirt, he sat down to enjoy his meal. As his deep brown eyes gazed down at the handkerchief, Nick was reminded of the beautiful girl who had given it to him in the first place…
…of Nimee Amee…
His former fiancé… his former love. It had been nearly a year since she had broken off their relationship, and part of him still missed her. Still, he had heard that she had taken up with a fellow in the Ozian army named Fyter, and he wished them all the best. But still, it was times like this that he felt lonely, that he wished for some female companionship…
It was at that moment that he felt a droplet of rain come down on his long brown hair. Looking up, he became depressed as he saw dark clouds forming overheard. The rain began to fall rapidly, drenching Nicolas even though he was under the branches of the Lunchpail tree. But as the young man looked to the sky, he noticed a rainbow forming in the sky over his head.
As the bright bridge of colors passed over his head, Nick thought he saw something fall off of the rainbow. A small, lithe shape came tumbling from the sky above, and plummeted towards the earth below. Squinting his eyes, Nicolas thought he must be hallucinating… for before his eyes fell the form of a beautiful woman, and it looked as if she would land but a few feet from where he stood.
Acting on reflex, he dashed to the spot where she would land, and caught her in his arms. Not believing what had just happened he could only stare at her in wonder. She wore a loose fitting dress of the purest white, and her skin was a fair tan color. The girls hair couldn't seem to make up it's mind what color it wanted to be, as it kept shifting from blue, to green, to orange, to purple in quick succession.
"Ummm… miss?" He said, trying to wake her. Having a girl just fall out of the sky was not out of the ordinary in a place like Oz, so it was no great shock to Nicolas Chopper, but it still did not happen every day. "Are you all right, miss?" Her eyes fluttered open, and the young woodsman found himself staring into the most beautiful pair of deep blue eyes he had ever seen.
"Did you save me from falling?" She asked in a sweet, honeyed voice. "Oh… why thank you."
As he set the young lady down, Nicolas found his face turning a deep red. "W-who are you miss?" He asked in awe. "What is your name?"
"My name is Polychrome, my good lumberjack." She replied, curtseying to hide her own blush. "And I am the daughter of the rainbow."
----
Over the next few days, Nick Chopper and his new visitor got to know each other. Nick allowed her to stay in his room at his home, while he himself slept in his shed. Through their conversations, Nick learned that Polychrome had fallen from her father's Rainbow when he was passing over Oz.
"It's not the first time I've fallen off or been left behind ,you see." She told him. "My father often gets careless when he's calming the weather after a storm. I'm sure he will come back looking for me soon."
"Your father can control the weather?" Nick asked
"Oh, yes." She replied. "But usually he and I only use are abilities to make the weather peaceful… that's why you see a rainbow after bad rain."
"Can you make bad weather, too?" Nick asked curiously.
Polychrome frowned. "Yes… but I prefer not to." She looked at him sadly. "I hate seeing innocent people getting hurt, Nicolas!"
-----
One particular day, Nicolas and Poly sat under a lunchpail tree, watching the clouds roll by over head. As they talked, Nicolas told her about himself.
"My father was a woodsman, as was his father before him." The young woodsman explained. "We have always lived here in the munchkin forest, chopping down trees to make a living."
"But it seems like a lonely life!" Polychrome exclaimed with pity. "Have you no family or friends?"
Nick shook his head. "My family have all long since passed on, but I do have a best friend named Boq." The young woodcutter looked up at the sky. "He and I grew up together, but he left to go attend the local university."
"Well then." Polychrome asked playfully. "Do you have a girlfriend?"
Nick turned red. "No... but I did once." He closed his eyes. "Her name was Nimee Amee, a local girl."
Poly's expression softened. "Oh, Nick.... what happened?"
The young woodsman shook his head. "We didn't see eye to eye on a lot of things... so she found someone else to love her." A tear rolled down Nick's cheek. "She said I spent too much time with my work, and not enough with her...she said I was heartless... "
As his voice grew pained, Polychrome placed a hand of his cheek. "It's okay, Nicolas..." She told him, smiling warmly. "Everything's going to be all right."
Then, the Rainbow's daughter took the sobbing woodsman into her arms, and comforted him.
---
As evening crept into the western sky, Nick had gone into the forest to chop some more lumber. He had hoped to use his earning from this latest batch of wood would net a high enough price to buy polychrome a new dress- a gift before she returned to the skies.
As he was chopping down a maple tree, he never heard the soft approach of a pair of ruby slippers coming up behind him.
"Nicolas Chopper?"
Spinning around, he at first thought it was Polychrome… but he quickly found himself looking at a strange woman he did not know.
"Yes, can I help you, Miss…"
He suddenly stopped speaking when he saw those ruby slippers, and his blood ran cold. Although he had never seen this woman before, he knew exactly who she was… the Wicked Witch of the East, the tyrannical ruler of Munchkin land, who terrorized the helpless munchkin populace with her black magic.
"What… what do you want?" He asked in a shaky voice.
She looked him up and down coldly. "You are the former fiancé of the woman Nimee Aimee, are you not?" Her harsh voice barked at him. "You abandoned her, and broke her heart, did you not?"
"How do you know about that?" Nicolas asked nervously.
"She is my loyal servant, and has told me everything about your former relationship." The Witch replied. "All the people of munchkin land are mine, even you normal sized folk. You had no right to pursue a relationship with one of my slaves... let alone break her heart."
"What do intend to do?" Nick asked in a warning tone. "If you try to hurt her in any way for what I did..."
"I will do nothing to her." The witch replied indignantly. " But I intend do use you as an example, a warning to any others who would dare defy my will."
The Witch clicked the heels of her ruby slippers together three times, and Nicolas felt his axe come to life in his hands, and he found himself unable to let go of it.
"Do not worry, your friend Sergeant Fyter will be following you to the grave soon enough." She turned, and started to walk away. "Farewell, Nicolas Chopper... this world will not miss a man who has no heart."
As she left, the wildly swinging axe cut first into Nick's right arm, chopping his hand off. Then, the uncontrollable blade swung downward, chopping his right leg off. Unable to let go of the axe, Nicolas Chopper could only scream in terrified agony as the enchanted blade hacked his body to pieces.
---
"Nicolas?" When he didn't come back home that evening, Polychrome followed the path she knew the young woodsman had taken. Seeing his axe lying on the path, she turned to look to see if he was in the woods nearby.
"Nicolas, are you th- AIEEEEE!" As soon as she saw the grisly remains, the sad wail of the rainbow's daughter filled the Munchkin forest, sending a chill down the spine of all who heard it.
---
"Please, you have to help him!" Polychrome pleaded. "He said you owed him money... and you're the only one I can turn to!"
"Well, I don't know..." Klip, the master smith of Oz, replied. He looked down at the basket of Nick's... parts... that he had collected from where Polychrome had told him to find them. "I do owe him for the last time he chopped wood for me... but I'm no doctor, I'm a blacksmith! What can I do for him?"
"Nicolas told me of your skills of making living machines... of creating clockwork men." Poly shook her head. "No doctor can help him now... but perhaps you can."
"Well I did build that Tik-Tok guard for the royal house of Ev … and that iron giant for the Nome King." He replied, remembering his time as an employee of Smith and Tinker. "Perhaps I can do something."
Looking over a set of blueprints, Klip thought for a moment. "His mind looks to be entirely intact... I think I can transfer his memories." He turned back to polychrome. "Yes, I believe I can do it!"
---
That night, the great furnace in Klip's smithy roared to life, and the master smith set about to work. Heating, hammering, and cooling piece after piece of tin, Klip shaped and molded them into the form of a man made entirely of metal.
Small gears and servomotor joints were installed that would allow this 'tin man' to bend, move, twist, and do any action- from something as aggressive as chopping a tree down, to something as delicate as picking a flower.
Klip gave him enhanced strength, capable of crushing a fierce Kalidah in his bare hands. He also gave him a face made of 'soft' metal, capable of moving, contorting, and twitching like any face made of flesh. Klip's hammer thundered down again and again, as it wrought a powerful new body to hold the essence of the hapless woodsmen.
Finally, the master smith let out a sigh of relief as he finished his work… until he remembered one important organ he had forgotten to give the new 'Tin Woodsman'.
"Ah, well… what's he going to do with a heart, anyway?" Klip asked himself, as he finished putting his tools away.
----
"Ok, Miss Polychrome, you can speak to him now."
As Klip left the room, Poly approached the Newly rebuilt Nick. A towering figure of Tin, she was a little intimidated by his overwhelming presence.
"Nicolas… can you hear me?" She asked nervously. His quartz eyes flickered, then lit up.
"Poly… what… hap-pen?" he asked in his new, mechanized voice.
"Klip the Smith saved your life, Nicolas." Poly replied, relieved to see he still had his sanity after everything that had happened to him. "Does it… hurt?"
"Don't… feel… anything." He replied mechanically. "Have… no…heart…"
Poly gave a small cry of shock. "You feel… nothing?" She turned away from him, trying to hide the tears welling up in her eyes. "Who… who did this to you, Nicolas?"
"Wicked… witch…of the East." He replied, his voice coming more controlled and expressive as he adjusted to his new vocal synthesizer. "She cursed my axe… and made me chop my own body to pieces."
The Rainbow's daughter looked back at him, her face now terrible to behold. Her hair moved around as if blown by a strong wind, and her eyes flashed with lightning. "Then the witch shall pay dearly for what she has done." Her voice rolled like a clap of thunder.
---
It was not very long before Polychrome's father came back for her, and the Rainbow's Daughter was returned to the sky. In a fit of anger, she crossed over to the 'other world', and raged across the plains of Kansas in the form of a terrible storm.
As she sent a cyclone down, Poly noticed a lone farmhouse sitting on the Kansas prairie below her. Seeing the family that lived there run into the safety of the storm cellar( and believing the house to be empty), the Rainbow's daughter picked up the house, and carried it through the mystical barrier to the Land of Oz.
As she had expected, Polychrome found the Wicked Witch of the East tormenting a village of Munchkins on the ground below. Pulling her cyclone back, Poly let the house drop like a stone towards it's intended target. The witch never saw it coming, and was squashed like a tomato crushed by a cinderblock.
Satisfied, the Rainbow's daughter flew off, never noticing the small figure that climbed out of the house after it had landed…
---
The Tin Woodsman tried to get back to his old life as best as possible… but nothing would ever be the same again. He no longer had to eat or sleep, no longer had the sensations of taste or touch. He wasn't sure if he missed these things or not, not being able to feel anything due to not having a heart anymore. All he could do was chop wood, keep himself oiled, and wait for Polychrome's next visit.
Poly… did he love her? He was certain if he still had a heart, he would most certainly love her as much as she loved him! But as it was now, he only felt a dull ache where a heart should be. Aimee was finally right... he really was heartless.
Hoping to get his mind off all of his problems, Nick decided to do some chores. But just as he began to chop some wood, the rain began to pour down on him. Looking aound, he noticed his oil can was nowhere in sight, and he was getting very, very soaked indeed....
(Hope you liked it! If this gets enough good reviews... next will be the Scarecrow!)