"Sweet Oz! What is that?!" Glinda screeched. Her high-pitched yelp echoed throughout Kiamo Ko and Elphaba came running at once.
"What's what?" she demanded. Glinda pointed soundlessly out the window. Then it was Elphaba's turn to cry out in surprise.
"Twister!" and sure enough, it was. Swirling on the horizon and moving swiftly across the grassy plains of the west was a giant tornado.
"We need to get to lower ground!" Elphaba cried, then she grabbed Glinda by the arm and all but dragged her down countless flights of stairs until they were in the basement of Kiamo Ko, crouched in a corner and terrified.
BANG! CREEEAAK! CRASH!
"Sweet, merciful Lurline!" Glinda muttered in terror, practically sitting in Elphaba's lap by that point. Elphaba couldn't think of what to say in reply. Instead, she only tried to pat Glinda on the back comfortingly.
A few minutes later, though, all the sounds and chaos stopped. The screaming wind and the sound of crashing objects above ceased.
"Is it over?" Glinda asked, shaking violently.
"Let's go see," Elphaba replied grimly. She managed to pry herself from Glinda's death grip and get up, mentally preparing herself for what she was going to find once she and Glinda made their way back up to the surface world... What she found was not what she expected at all.
"Glinda. I have a feeling we're not in Oz anymore..."
The two witches climbed up the last few steps of the basement and, instead of finding themselves back on the main floor of Kiamo Ko, they found themselves overlooking... a farm? Somehow, the basement of the castle had been detached in the tornado, but nothing else, and then it had been flung all the way out here. Wherever that was. As Elphaba emerged from the remains of the basement, she noticed a pair of hooves sticking out from underneath the stones of the castle. Ooops, they had hit a cow.
"Hello! And what have we here?!" a voice suddenly called out to the two witches. They turned around to see three gangly young men approaching them curiously. Elphaba and Glinda could only stare. These fellows didn't look very much like Ozians...
"Oy! And who are you?" one of them demanded when Elphaba and Glinda could only stare at them in silence.
"Oh! Uhhh, we are, uhhh, well, I am... I am Glinda Arduenna-Upland," Glinda stuttered first, trying to gain her bearings as the men drew closer.
"And I'm Elphaba Thropp," Elphaba replied, just as unsure as Glinda was about all of this.
"Oy! Elphaba's got green skin!" one of the trio exclaimed once he finally realized what was wrong with her.
"Say Hunk, that's real observant of ya!" another of the trio said sarcastically.
"Oh, don't be so heartless, Hickory," the third of the trio replied with a frown, defending Hunk.
"You're one to talk, Zeke," Hickory snickered. "You're a right baby! You were the one bawling when the twister came down!"
"We could've died!" Zeke tried to defend himself, then the three men began to bicker amongst themselves.
After a few snide remarks and several cuss words, however, Glinda finally intervened.
"Um, excuse me, but can you tell us where we are?" she asked, stopping the fight before it could get physical.
"The Gale Family Farm. Kansas," they replied. Elphaba and Glinda cast each other confused looks before Glinda spoke again.
"I am assuming you three are the Gales?" she asked politely.
"No, not us," they replied, laughing. "We're only the farmhands."
"Well, can you take us to meet the Gales proper?" Glinda requested again. Although she was in a totally new world, the art of requesting and demanding of strangers was still very useful to her here. Elphaba remained quiet, allowing Glinda to take control of this part of their adventure.
"If you'd like," the trio replied, then they gestured for the two young women to follow them eastward.
A few minutes later, a big red barn came into view. Standing outside around it was a man, a woman, and a little girl with a dog in her lap.
"Ma'am! We've got visitors!" the farm boys cried. The lady turned away from the barn when she heard the three men call out to her.
"Ah! And who are you?" she asked the moment Elphaba and Glinda were within earshot. "And good gracious me! Are you... green?"
For the second time that day, Elphaba and Glinda introduced themselves, before explaining how they had come here after a tornado swept up a portion of their house and landed it in the field only a few leagues away from the barn.
"Uncanny!" the man remarked, seeming amazed that the two women had not died in the tornado. They hardly even looked scratched or bruised, despite claiming that they had practically fallen right out of the sky. But then again, given that one of them had green skin, perhaps surviving a tornado was not the strangest thing about the two.
"Too right!" one of the farmhands nodded.
For a moment more, the Gales and their three farmhands could only marvel at the arrival of Elphaba and Glinda before the lady seemed to snap awake from a trance, instantly chastising herself.
"Forgive my rudeness!" she cried. "But allow me to introduce myself! I am Em Gale, and this is my husband, Henry," she gestured from herself to the man standing beside her.
"And I'm Dorothy!" the little girl interrupted before the lady could introduce her. "And this is my little dog, Toto!" she added. The dog yapped, as if to agree with Dorothy's statement about him.
"You two are very pretty," Dorothy added a moment later, giving them both a shy smile.
"Well, thank you!" Glinda was flattered at once, smoothing her tresses with a sweet smile. Elphaba only rolled her eyes. Oz, what a strange land! And most unsettling of all, to her at least, was the lack of reaction regarding her skin. True, Em and the farm boys had been alarmed at first, but the moment she told them that it was natural (or at least, as natural as green skin could be), they quieted back down. Elphaba wasn't used to such simple and sincere acceptance of her skin color. To her, that was the strangest thing of all about this Kanziz place. And, speaking of..
"Can you tell us how to get home? To Oz?" Elphaba asked. She wanted to go home. Now.
"Oz?" all of the Gales echoed in confusion. "We've never heard of such a place!"
"What?" now it was Elphaba and Glinda's turn to be confused. But there was despair mixed with their confusion. How would they get home now?!
"Well! You could live with us!" little Dorothy said, beaming. It was obvious she would've quite liked some more female company aside from the elderly Em. Although Elphaba and Glinda were both much older than Dorothy, they were closer to Dorothy's age than anyone else on the farm. Her eyes shone hopefully. What a lonely child she must've been, to be so eager for new friends!
"Well, since it seems that we have no other choice..." it was Elphaba who answered, and although she sounded very reluctant and guarded, she resigned herself anyway to Dorothy's offer. Dorothy looked delighted. She insisted, quite passionately, that she just simply had to give them the tour of the farm right at that very moment! And what could Elphaba and Glinda do but accept?
A few hours later, Glinda and Elphaba were busy helping run the farm. Although the Gales had been generous enough to allow Elphaba and Glinda to stay with them, it was not going to be a free lodging. They were going to earn their place with the Gales through a lot of back-breaking work, but both of them were more than willing to oblige. Elphaba, herself, was no stranger to hard labor. And she had helped out in some of the farms and fields back in Munchkinland in her youth, so she was no stranger to farm work either. And even Glinda, though very new to the concept of working outdoors in back-breaking labor, was far too much of a neat-freak and overseer to allow the messy farm to remain in the sorry state it was in at the moment. She was almost more diligent than Elphaba, channeling all of her perfectionist ways into helping her work the farm.
But towards the end of that grueling day, a rather snobby old woman came riding along down the road on a black bicycle...
"Ah! And who on earth are these people?" she demanded with a sneer as she biked past the Gale farm. She gestured rudely to Elphaba and Glinda.
"Almira Gultch!" Em reared back, voice full of venom. "What do you want?" and she already knew Almira was about to make some demand of the Gales, for she only ever willingly spoke to them if that were the case. Had Almira not had a demand to make, she would've biked right on by without even looking. But by stopping and offering up her typical snide remarks about the family, it was a clear sign that she had a bone to pick.
"For you to keep your wretched niece and her horrid rat away from my garden," Almira retorted, gesturing to a shamefaced Dorothy and Toto.
"Oh, come now," Henry came to Dorothy's defense with a casual smile. "What harm could she have done this time?"
"Your snotty little brat and her four-legged monstrosity trampled through my yard and then ate my flowers," she snapped back, more than happy to tell Henry exactly what Dorothy could have done this time.
"Dorothy ate your flowers?" Henry asked in mock surprise, pretending not to understand Almira's statement. Almira shot him a death glare.
"No! Her dog!" she cried in exasperation. Heavens, did she despise the Gales! A bunch of uncultured, unintelligent swine! Ugly, unclean imbeciles!
"Now, you people need to keep a tighter leash on both of them!" she said, pointing damningly at Dorothy and Toto both. Then she launched into a lecture against Em and Henry about how to raise Dorothy. It went on for about two and a half minutes before Elphaba finally interjected.
"Just plant some more flowers and be done with it!" she snapped. "There is no need to tell Em and Henry how to raise their own niece! She is only a child after all!" Almira turned her icy glare against Elphaba.
"Ugh!" she gave a disgusted sniff. "A talking green bean! Though I cannot say I'm surprised. You will meet all sorts of dreadful people in these circles," her beady eyes swept over the entire farm, shooting daggers through the Gales, the farmhands, Elphaba and Glinda.
"Don't you dare talk about her like that!" Glinda snapped. Although she had managed to tolerate Almira this far, the moment the woman dared to speak out against Elphaba, Glinda snapped completely. In a fit of blind fury, she bent over and grabbed a handful of mud. Without even thinking, she slung it good and hard at Almira's face. It didn't miss its target.
There was complete and utter silence for a full 10 seconds before everyone, minus Almira of course, began to stifle laughter.
"Oh my goodness!" Em exclaimed. "I am afraid that my guests do not know their manners!" she pretended to tut, but the little smile she shot Glinda was not missed by anyone at all.
"Here, come, come! Let us get you cleaned up!" Henry agreed, also swallowing down laughter as he made to help Almira off her bike.
"No! No! That will not be necessary!" she shrieked angrily, yanking violently away from Henry's outstretched arms. "Just stay away from me!"
"With pleasure!" Glinda snarled, still seething over what Almira had said about Elphaba.
"But wasn't it you who came to visit us in the first place?" Henry asked, that false stupidity returning to his face once more.
"If you wish to have an escort home, we would be happy to send Dorothy back with you!" Em agreed, joining her husband's little game. Dorothy gave Almira a sickeningly sweet smile before smoothing her muddy skirt down flatteringly. Almira only scrunched up her nose in disgust once more before defiantly swiping some of the mud from her eyes and biking away again, cursing under her breath as she took off down the road again.
The moment she was out of earshot, the stifled laughter became a full-on roar, and because there were so many people in attendance, the laughter was very long and very loud. At last, however, everyone managed to settle back down.
"Oh! But Dorothy! Why were you in Almira's yard? You know better than that!" Em tried to chastise her wayward niece. She was genuinely upset that Dorothy had wandered into a place she had, repeatedly, been told not to go to, but she was still so tickled by Glinda's little stunt that she laughed even as she tried to discipline Dorothy.
"I was just visiting Professor Marvel," Dorothy replied innocently. "And Almira's yard was a shortcut. I didn't mean any harm!"
"Professor Marvel?" Glinda interrupted. Now didn't that sound like a magical name!? Maybe there was a spell that this professor could use to send her and Elphaba back home? Hope rekindled itself in Glinda's chest.
"Yes," Dorothy explained. "He's a traveling magician who sometimes visits these parts, and I quite like him. I think he's funny!"
"Score!" Glinda muttered under breath, and she began to grin like a maniac.
Another 45 minutes later, Professor Marvel was standing at the gateway to the Gale farm. At his side was Dorothy, who had gone to fetch him when Glinda and Elphaba requested of it, insisting that he might be able to help them find their way home. Although Em had protested, Dorothy scampered away from Em could tell her not to bother. This time, though, she made sure not to skirt through Almira's yard when going to visit the professor. Now, they were back.
"Greetings!" Professor Marvel tipped his hat as he followed Dorothy up to the barn where the others all waited. Once he had arrived in full, Elphaba and Glinda explained their problem at once.
"Oz huh?" he asked once the story was over.
"Yes, sir!" Elphaba and Glinda replied in unison.
"Well, perhaps I have a spell to get you back," he made a grand gesture and smiled broadly at them.
"Bah! Magic!" Em scoffed under her breath. That was part of the reason she had wanted to warn Dorothy away from fetching him. For one, she didn't want Dorothy anywhere near Almira, or her property, for at least three days until Almira had a chance to cool off. She would be especially mad after Glinda's little mud-slinging stunt. And for another, Em held no faith in Professor Marvel and was convinced he was only a fraud. But Professor Marvel ignored her skepticism and rolled up his sleeves. He began to chant mysteriously, but nothing happened.
"Ah! I forgot!" he cried, embarrassed. "I need a wand! Allow me to get one! I have several back home!" he added, then he took off running before anyone could say another word.
"I told you he was a fake!" Em muttered in disdain as she watched him go.
"But Glinda and I aren't!" Elphaba murmured in realization as she watched the professor run away. Whether or not he would be back like he promised was immaterial. If magic did exist in this world, then maybe Elphaba could perform the spell herself. Did she need a magician from this world to do it for her? Well. There was only one way to find out...
Elphaba began to chant, but unlike Professor Marvel, her voice was low and smooth. It was not flashy or loud. It was assured, and unlike Professor Marvel, her spell worked. Suddenly, another wind swept across the Gale family farm, but although this one was powerful, it lacked the same frightening and violent intensity of a regular tornado. The wind came from every direction, but it all focused upon two points: Elphaba and Glinda. Leaving everything else untouched, the wind wrapped around the two Ozians and lifted them right up off the ground and into the air.
"It worked!" Elphaba exclaimed as she and Glinda began to rise up, the wind swirling all around them and keeping them aloft. Down below, Em collapsed in a dead faint while Henry and the farmhands could only stare upward at the two Ozians, wide-eyed and open-mouthed.
"Oh! They're going somewhere over the rainbow!" Dorothy exclaimed, being the only one delighted instead of dumbstruck. She clapped merrily as the two witches rose higher and higher up.
"Oh! Goodbye, my new friends, goodbye!" she waved. "Do come back and visit some time if you can!"
"Goodbye!" Elphaba and Glinda shouted back down, then they rose straight up through the clouds and could see no more of the Gale family farm.
After a time, the duo began to descend and when they finally reached the ground, they were standing right outside Kiamo Ko, and not so much as a single tiny pebble from the castle's stony foundation looked out of place. Nor did any of the plan or wildlife that surrounded the castle. After that violent tornado, everything looked perfectly unscathed and untouched.
Additionally, once the two witches reentered their castle home, they found everything inside to be entirely unbroken. Despite all the crashing and bashing during the storm, nothing was broken. And the castle basement was back too! The very one they had flown out on! And it was back! Right where it should have been! And there wasn't even the tiniest of cracks in the wall to indicate a separation from the rest of the castle!
"Did that really just happen?" Elphaba asked as she and Glinda stared at the smooth basement wall before them. How was it possible?!
"No idea," Glinda replied tiredly. She sounded utterly done with everything by that point. She was no more comprehending of this situation than Elphaba was but, frankly, she had had enough adventure for one day. Now, she just wanted to lie down and take a nap.
Meanwhile, worlds away, Em had finally woken up from her little fainter.
"Did that really just happen?" Dorothy asked, still sounding a bit star-struck as she and the rest of her family sat around Em's bedside.
"No idea," Em replied tiredly. She sounded utterly done with everything by that point. She was no more comprehending of this situation than Dorothy was but, frankly, she had had enough adventure for one day. Now, she just wanted to lie down and take a nap.
AN: Just a silly little reverse fic where an Ozian comes to our world. And of course Elphaba and Glinda would have to meet little Dorothy and the rest of her crew, and then of course they had to meet Earth's Wicked Witch: Almira Gultch.