Iamgoku (Shaun): Hello readers, welcome to this new little endeavor into the world of Wicked.
Doglover645 (Julie): This story has been a long, LONG, time in the making. We broke a PM conversation over it and are still going strong nonetheless.
Shaun: Oh yeah XD Though the PM system now does except longer lasting conversations, back then it broke at about 1,700. This story has been on the backburner for a while, but a recent rush of inspiration has kick started it once again.
Julie: So, without further ado, we present Worlds Apart but Ever Closer, a Wicked fanfic by iamgoku and Doglover645.
The sun was shining in the sky above New York and all seemed well in the world, a teenager with wavy dark chocolate brown hair, brown eyes, and a caramel brown tan skin was currently sitting on a couch in an apartment and reading through a book peacefully, he placed a mug down next to the him and smiled, this was the first time in a while that he was able to relax in the past few weeks since the move.
His name was Shaun, he was eighteen and he had recently moved to America with his mother. She had met a woman who had been on an extended holiday in Australia, and had to Shaun's surprise been almost instantly in love with her, she had stayed in Australia for almost half a year before needing to return, and had proposed while she had the chance.
Thus Shaun now found himself in a completely new country and a new home, and had a step-mother now, but all of that wasn't what really bothered the eighteen year old, he had dealt with all that rather well.
It was her.
He now had to put up with his new step sister who was a few years younger than him, and seemed to be constantly causing him headaches. Their parents sometimes found it amusing while other times were worried about the two, their personalities clashed and they couldn't seem to go one day without fighting or bickering, and more than a few times that led to either wrecked furniture or rooms becoming a mess.
"Hey!"
'Well so much for some peace and quiet' Shaun thought before turning to see her standing there frowning at him with her arms crossed.
The girl, Julie, stared down at him with angry hazel eyes. Her reddish-brown hair was tied in its signature long braid which fell neatly over her shoulder. She glared at him as she pushed the brown frames of her glasses back up her nose.
"Yeah, what do you want, I'm reading," Shaun said gruffly, he somehow knew this wouldn't end well.
"Did you drink all the hot chocolate?" Julie asked annoyed.
Shaun turned from her to the mug he had placed on the side, Julie looked at it and her frown intensified, he sighed before answering simply.
"Yes, yes I did."
"Why?!"
"Because I wanted some hot chocolate, and if I remember correctly your mum said and I quote 'you can have anything you want from the kitchen' and last time I checked, that included hot chocolate," Shaun said, before attempting to return to his reading only for Julie's voice to interrupt him.
"I always have the last of it, that's been that way for like….forever!" she said walking around in the front of the couch and looking like she wanted to hit him with something.
"Well things change, like how I was brought halfway around the world and am now living with an overly hyper teenage drama queen with a sword obsession," he said smirking, before he turned back to his book, not noticing or ignoring the glare being directed his way that was threatening to burn holes through his book.
"Ok, fine," Julie said evenly before walking away out of his line of sight.
Shaun smiled as he was once again left in peace.
"Well that was easier than I-"
His words were interrupted as he heard a small click, and looked up to see Julie holding a can in her hands.
Several seconds later Shaun found his face assaulted by the can of whip cream, Julie was now grinning as she held down the nozzle until the can ran out of cream.
She struggled to contain her laughter at the sight, his entire face was covered in whipped cream and she couldn't see any of his features, until a few seconds later he spat out of the cream in his mouth creating a small hole.
"You're so dead!"
Julie quickly jumped to the side as he lunged for her only to go face first into a lamp and fall back due to his eyes being covered in whipped cream. The younger of the two now couldn't contain her laughter and laughed openly at the sight of his frantically whipping the whipped cream away.
"I'm going to make you regret that!" he said as he got up and ran at her.
"Hah, you'll have to catch me first!" Julie replied a she ran out of the room at top speed.
"We have something to tell you," Julie and Shaun's mother (in Shaun's case step-mother) Susan said during dinner that night. The two step-siblings had been glaring at each other throughout the entire meal; Shaun was still angry about the whole whipped cream incident from earlier.
"And that would be..." Julie trailed, trying to pry more information out of her mother.
"Well, we're a little tired of you two bickering-" Judy, Shaun's mother (and Julie's step-mother), started, but the two teens cut her off.
"It's his fault." Julie said.
"It's her fault." Shaun said at the exact same time.
Susan and Judy exchanged looks and sighed.
"We're sending you two out to...bond."
"Please don't say we're going camping." Julie pleaded.
"No, in fact the opposite. You're going to Broadway."
Shaun raised an eyebrow. "Broadway?"
"Broadway is a very special place, filled with very special people, who can sing and dance, often at the same time." Judy smiled.
"I know what Broadway is, but how are we going to 'bond' over it?" Shaun asked.
"Well, your mother said that you seem to like a little musical called Wicked...and Julie has a love for it too...so we bought two tickets for you two to see the show together," Susan said, smiling.
Julie was grinning widely, as if her face might split down the middle at any moment. "When?" She asked.
"Tomorrow night, seven sharp." Susan said. She stood up and grabbed an envelope off the counter and held it up. "Tickets are in here." She said as the two teenagers looked at the envelope with mixed expressions.
Shaun sat down in his room the following evening, he had gotten dressed and was now talking on Skype with one of his friends back in Australia, at least until Julie was ready to go.
"It can't be that bad," the blond haired teenager said on the screen, she was thin and had a petite frame, and was wearing a pink robe.
"You don't know what it's like Sara," Shaun replied stubbornly.
"I don't know why you're making such a fuss, she doesn't seem so bad, I met her at the wedding and she seemed really nice," the girl said calmly.
"An act, all an act until she reveals her true nature, which I am convinced is to personally make my life as difficult and as stressful as humanly possible, I swear she is constantly planning something against me," he said annoyed.
"You're blowing things all out of proportion" she replied evenly "And besides it can't be her fault entirely, you do have a tendency to…."
"To what?" He inquired with a raised eyebrow.
"Well, you can be a bit antagonistic," she said. "And stubborn," she added in afterthought.
"Okay Sara."
"And you can be a bit of a dick-"
"Okay, thank you! Far out, I get on here for some friendly conversation and you decide to bloody psychoanalyze me," he said with a huff.
"Well it might shed some light on why you apparently hate her so much, considering you're not always easy to get along with," she said.
"I-I don't…I don't hate her," he said, his voice stumbling slightly. He drew a breath and continued. "I just really have an extreme dislike for her," he finished evenly.
"I'm sure there's some form of distinction from hate in there isn't there," Sara deadpanned.
"Come on!" A voice from outside the room called. "Time to go!"
Shaun sighed and his shoulders fell.
"I now am in store for over two hours of intense sugar high fangirling, might want to wish me luck." He said as Sara chuckled slightly.
"If you make us late I will use my sword!" Julie's voice rang out from the other room, despite the sword she owned only being made of wood.
"…Ok, might want to wish Julie luck," Shaun said as his eye twitched "Because it might take all my willpower not to strangle her with a belt before this night is over!"
"Ok Shaun, sure," Sara said dryly.
"I'm serious!"
Julie's suddenly walked through the open door and walked over to where he was sitting. "Come on!" she exclaimed hitting him with a cushion on the face.
Shaun pointed to her with an annoyed expression as Sara laughed before he cut off the connection. He then turned towards the door as Julie disappeared from sight and walked down the hall.
He was about to head out when he stopped, turning back to the desk the laptop was on he opened one of the drawers and reached inside, pulling out a thin ball chain with two military identification tags on them, or 'dog tags'. The rectangular metal tags were worn and scratched to the point that the words on them were unrecognizable.
They belonged to his father, his birth father. Shaun had never met the man, as he had left before Shaun was born, his mother didn't speak of him often, and all Shaun knew was that he was Canadian. The tags were all he had left of his father.
Slipping them on his neck before tucking them under his shirt, he proceeded out to meet Julie.
"That was Ozmapolitan!" Julie exclaimed as they both were exiting the Gershwin Theatre, Shaun was also smiling though less enthusiastically.
"Yes, it was good, though I would have preferred you not to be whacking my bloody arm the whole time," Shaun said as he gave her a pointed look.
"Oh come on, it was only during the Governor's Mansion scene," Julie said casually.
"And Dancing through Life," Shaun said stiffly as they prepared to cross the road, where they were to wait for their parents to arrive to pick them up.
A sudden gust of wind, however, caused Julie's program to blow out of her hands and it blew back across the ground, unbeknownst to Shaun who kept walking, she quickly jogged back to get it.
Shaun reached the other side of the street before he looked back to see her picking it up, sighing slightly.
"Can you not go five seconds without-" he began but was cut off as he saw a car coming towards Julie, more alarmingly the driver either didn't see her or wasn't paying attention.
"Julie stop!" he cried out, she looked at him in confusion before squinting as a light caught her eye and she turned to see the car coming towards her with no signs of braking, her eyes widened in fear.
Shaun didn't have time to think as he ran towards her, hoping to get her out of the way.
Julie tried to run in the opposite direction as the car was only seconds away, and just as Shaun reached her the car's headlights engulfed them.
For a moment everything was white, as if the light from the headlights had engulfed their sights completely. But it quickly faded, and the two found themselves in a great expanse of green, a luscious green field that seemed to span onwards as far as they could see.
"What the fuck...where are we?" Shaun muttered as he starred at their surroundings with confusion. Julie was silent as she had a similar expression of shock and confusion as she looked around for something or someone to try and determine where they were, or what had happened.
"You're in a side dimension," a female voice said, seemingly coming out of nowhere. Shaun and Julie quickly turned around to see the origin of the voice, and standing a few feet from them was a woman who looked to be in her mid-forties. She was of average height, and had honey blonde hair, brown eyes with a hint of green, and was wearing what looked to be a black dress shirt with matching pants and cream colored high heels.
Her expression was calm as she smiled at them softly, this however didn't make them feel any less surprised.
"What!? Who the heck are you, and where are we?" Julie asked.
The woman merely gave a small nod before speaking.
"My name is Evanora, and I know this must be confusing for you, but let me explain. This place is a side dimension, a plain between worlds. I had a friend of mine bring you here for a reason" Evanora explained calmly.
Shaun looked at her with disbelief. "Yeah, sure it is. Look lady why don't you just tell us where we really are, and how the hell we get home."
Evanora gave a small sigh before looking at them again. "I see this might take more than my word to convince you," she said before turning to Julie.
"Do you feel any different?"
Julie gave her a confused look. "Different...Different how?"
"When you arrived here the process should have already begun to change you," she said before looking at Shaun. "You however, might experience it differently"
"Experience what!? You're not making any sense," Shaun said with a distrusting look, nothing about what was happening currently was making sense.
"Maybe I should start with why you're here, then we can get to that," Evanora said before taking a breath.
"You two have been chosen, for a special task. One that has been foretold to me by a friend of mine, he is a sorcerer named Caine, and according to him, the two of you are the right choices for what needs to happen," she said to them seriously.
"You are familiar with the musical 'Wicked' from our world. Well it is so much more, the Land of Oz does truly exist. In fact there are many different Oz's, many alternate and parallel versions all with different diverging paths and differences. Though all with the same core people," Evanora explained as the two listened intently.
Shaun still didn't look convinced, though Julie seemed to be slowly becoming more and more awed at the woman's words.
"You are to go to Shiz, we have already sorted out your enrolment. When you get there, you are to watch over Elphaba, Galinda, Nessarose and Fiyero," Evanora said as Julie spoke up.
"Why?! Is it Morrible?"
Evanora shook her head. "Not entirely, you must not interfere too much. Some events in the time stream cannot be changed, no matter how hard you try. But there are other threats that may appear, you are to make sure that they survive them."
"Not saying I believe you or anything, but if this is true. Why us?" Shaun asked, crossing his arms.
"As I said before, you are both the right choices for this task. When I said that Julie should start feeling different, or changes, it was about her latent abilities," Evanora said causing Julie to look at her.
"Abilities? What abilities?" Julie asked, Evanora merely smiled.
"When you arrived here, you were endowed with a hidden ability by my sorcerer friend, he used his magic to give you powers, making you a meta-human. These powers should be beginning to activate now. You won't immediately be able to control them perfectly or call upon them, but you should be able to do small feats, just try and concentrate," she said as Julie looked at her with confusion before trying to concentrate.
"You should be able to feel something inside of you, something that hasn't been present before."
Shaun watched as Julie closed her eyes, clenching her hands at her side and her face screwing up into twisted expression, causing him to let out a short laugh.
Julie shot him a dirty look before turning to Evanora.
"I don't know what I'm meant to be feeling here."
"Here, try concentrating on this," Evanora said, reaching down and picking up a twig, she passed it to Julie who starred at it.
"Try pushing it out into the twig, it might help if you have something physical to channel it into," Evanora explained.
Julie looked at her questionably, before looking at Shaun who shrugged and motioned for her to try.
Gripping the twig she levelled her eyes at it and tried to concentrate, her hands clenching up as she glared at the twig.
For several moments, nothing happened, they all just stood there and watched.
However Julie did begin to feel something. Something warm began to well up in the pit of her stomach. She found it spreading to her hands, and her palms begin to become sweaty, concentrating on the warm feeling her eyes widened when suddenly the twig lit up with flame.
"Yargh!" she exclaimed before dropping the twig before the flame could spread further down. Shaun's eyes widened at the sight of the twig that quickly burned and blackened on the ground before the flame died down.
"Interesting," Evanora said, watching the flame disappear. "It seems Caine gave you an affinity for fire."
"Woah..." Julie said, her eyes travelling from her hands to the twig, and back to her hands again. "Wait?" Julie turned to Evanora. "If I have fire powers, why did I feel the twig burn, shouldn't it not hurt?" She asked.
Evanora looked thoughtfully before speaking. "It may be that you can create and control flame, but your body hasn't changed externally and the flames can still hurt you if they come in contact with you."
Julie nodded, remembering to store that information away for later. "So what's his power?" Julie asked, pointing to Shaun. "What kind of meta-human powers did your friend give Shaun?"
Shaun turned to Evanora with interest, thinking that Julie had pretty interesting powers.
Evanora shook her head. "Oh no, Caine didn't give him any powers."
This caused Shaun to give her a questioning look.
"What do you mean, she has powers and I don't, that doesn't seem fair."
Julie shook her head and smirked. "Not everyone can be as awesome as me" she said, causing Shaun to give her a dry look.
Evanora spoke up. "Oh he does have abilities, but he didn't need to be given powers. He's a Mutant."
This caused both of them to be silent and look at the older woman. "...I'm a what?!" Shaun exclaimed.
"You're a Mutant," Evanora repeated herself. Shaun merely starred at her for a moment before speaking up.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean you didn't need to be given abilities by magic, as you naturally have abilities that have been dormant. This is possible due to you possessing what is known as the 'X-Gene' a genetic mutation in your DNA. Most Mutant's abilities and mutations activate earlier. Your abilities will activate, when the time is right," she said to them, causing Shaun to look slightly annoyed, while at the same time looking on in contemplation.
Evanora then turned to Julie and smiled. "I also know you have a liking for swords," she said, causing Julie's eyes to light up.
"Yeah, I do," Julie replied, causing Evanora to smile and nod.
"Caine has a sword made for you, you should have it when you arrive in Oz, along with some supplies," Evanora said before clapping her hands.
"Anyway, you two have to get going," she said to them. "Don't worry about the tiredness, Caine's spell should be activating now."
"What ...spell...?" Shaun said as he let out a yawn.
Shaun and Julie both suddenly felt a wave of tiredness begin to overtake them, their eyes beginning to droop. Shaun slowly made it to the ground and rolled onto his side, Julie doing the same as they both gave a yawn.
The last thing Shaun heard before falling to sleep was Evanora's voice.
"It's okay being a mutant, there's nothing wrong with it. I'm one too," she said before Shaun's eyes shut completely.
Julie's eyes fluttered open slowly as she regained consciousness. Her body was stiff, as if she had slept on it the wrong way, and she still felt a little dizzy, but managed to stand.
She felt a weight on her back, and noticed that she now had a backpack on, as well as her left side which now contained her sword and scabbard it was a mid-length blade, similar to a knight's sword from a fairy tale but shorter for her to be able to use it easier, she also noticed her clothing has changed, she was now wearing a yellow checkered shirt button up shirt, a dark grey shirt underneath that, dark blue almost black pants, and black shoes.
Smiling at her new found weapon, she then looked around to see that she was standing near a dirt road, and the surroundings were mostly forest and trees, though there was a sign up the road that she could barely make out.
A groan interrupted her thoughts as she turned to see Shaun lying on the ground as she had been moments ago.
"Shaun."
He looked up at the sound of his name and saw her standing there, he slowly stood up, and his joints cracked slightly as he got to his feet. He was wearing a similar backpack to Julie's. His clothing has changed as well, he was now wearing dark blue pants, a white T-shirt, black boots, and a brown coat.
"You know, when she said we would arrive in Oz, I pictured us being at Shiz, not in the middle of some forest," he said slightly annoyed as he rubbed his eyes.
"Well, maybe if we check out that sign, we'll have an idea of where we are," Julie said as she pointed to the sign up the road, Shaun nodded as they proceeded to walk along the dirt path.
A few minutes passed before they reached the sign and in large white lettering it said City of Shiz: 60 Miles
"Sixty miles!" Julie exclaimed as Shaun merely dropped his head before sighing.
"Well this'll be a fun walk," he said dryly before turning to Julie.
"We might have to camp out tonight, we should be able to make it there tomorrow depending on how much ground we can cover,"
Julie let out a groan of annoyance but began walking ahead, followed by her step-brother who smirked slightly at her reaction.
"This might not be so bad after all."
A few hours later, Julie's hand flickered as she held them up as if holding an invisible ball. Small sparks flickered between her hands as she had a look of concentration on her face.
"This is harder than I thought," she remarked as Shaun walked alongside her, glancing over every so often.
"Well at least you know what your abilities are; all I got was some cryptic little message 'when the time is right you shall know'. Would it be so bad just to have told me before she dropped us in the middle of a forest and is now having us walk all the way to Shiz?" Shaun ranted as Julie continued to create something bigger than a spark.
Julie's eyes lit up suddenly as she held her hands inward more, and Shaun looked over to see instead of sparks, there was a small flame suspended in her hands, similar to a candle's flame.
"Oh yeah, I did it!" Julie said excitedly as she held the little flame in her hand.
"Wow, that's pretty good for only a short time of practice," Shaun said, genuinely impressed.
"At least we can start a fire now later tonight," he said. Julie smiled as she tried to make the flame bigger.
"Jealous?" Julie asked with a smirk, Shaun's smile dropped and he got annoyed at the comment.
"No, I'm sure whatever my powers are, will be better than being a walking matchstick," he said as looked away to the path ahead.
Julie continued to try and make her flame bigger; however a sudden noise caught her attention.
"Wait d-did you hear that?" she asked as she stopped in her tracks.
"Hear what?" Shaun asked as he looked around, he hadn't heard a sound.
Two grunts were heard from behind them as the two swung around to see two men standing there, seemingly coming out of nowhere.
They both wearing similar clothing, thick coats, and scarves around the lower halves of their faces and hats covering most of the other half, one of them was tall and the other only slightly smaller than him, but they both screamed trouble.
"…Hi…" Julie said slowly.
"Afternoon," the taller man said curtly.
"You seem to be a little over packed there," the shorter man said. "Me an' my buddy here thought we'd relieve you of some of your load," he said pointing to their backpacks, his eyes also lit up at the sight of Julie's sword.
Julie turned to Shaun. "I think they want to steal our stuff," she said softly.
"They're bandits," he replied obviously as he inspected both of them.
"Maybe their nice bandits?" Julie said hopefully.
"I sincerely doubt that."
Shaun turned to the taller one and narrowed his eyes.
"I'm afraid we can't part with our belongings, you see we have to get somewhere by tomorrow, and we might need them, so you see that's where we're going to say no, mate," he said evenly, however he knew this wouldn't end with them simply exchanging a few words.
The taller man sighed slightly.
"And I really didn't want to have to rough up you two kids, but you leave me no choice," he said turning to his partner.
"You take the girl; I got the brat with the weird accent."
"Wait, weird acce-" Shaun began but was cut off as the taller man had quickly bridged the distance between them and Shaun felt the man's fist connect with his jaw, sending him reeling back.
"Shaun!" Julie exclaimed before the shorter man was in front of her, Julie quickly pulled her sword free from its scabbard and held it out in front of her.
"Hah, that's cute brat, but you're no match for me, I've taken out grown men with swords before, you'll be a piece a' cake," he said brandishing two short swords from beneath his coat.
Shaun had managed to recover from the surprise hit to the jaw, only to be facing the man who was standing above him menacingly. Before he could make a move the man reached down and grabbed him by the front of his shirt and swung him around, throwing him back several feet and crashing into a tree trunk.
"Is getting my ass kicked by bandits 'The right time' lady, cause it sure wouldn't hurt to have some powers right now!" he groaned out mostly to himself as he forced himself to his feet and readied for the bandits next move.
Julie was trading blades with the shorter bandit, and so far she was holding her ground, much to the surprise of the bandit.
"You're not bad, better than I thought" he remarked. He swung his left blade down towards her legs, only for Julie to bring her side down horizontally to block it, and immediately sliding it up to block the right hand blade from slashing her stomach.
She held the blades back simultaneously, and she grit her teeth as her stance began to falter, she may have been skilled, but the man was physically stronger and she wasn't sure if she could outlast him stamina wise. She tried using her power, focusing it into her right hand, if she was going to do what she was planning, it would have to be at just the right moment.
Her right hand began to heat up, and she focused on the same thoughts she did before when she made the flame in her hand. Closing her eyes she counted to three before removing her right hand of her sword's grip and thrusting it forward hitting the man in the chest, Julie wasn't sure if it was luck or the adrenaline, but the resulting burst of flame combined with her palm thrust flew the man back several feet, knocking the blades out of his hands and leaving a charred hand print on his shirt.
"Whoa," she remarked as she looked at the man's fallen form, he seemed to be winded.
Shaun however wasn't fairing as well, the taller bandit was hitting him repeatedly in different areas, one in the face followed by a jab to the gut, then a punch to the face again, and so on and so forth. The bandit pulled back his fist and delivered a fast haymaker to Shaun's forehead, sending him flying back and onto the ground once again, his backup falling off him and his head spinning and disoriented.
"I'll give you this brat, you sure can take a punch," the tall bandit said. He slowly closed the distance between them.
Shaun could hear his heart beating in his chest; it seemed to slow down along with everything else around him, the bandit's steps slowing to a snail's pace.
Before suddenly everything sped up again and he once again found the strength to stand, before the bandit could deliver another blow, Shaun's fist flew forward with previous unseen speed and buried itself into the bandit's stomach. The older man gasped for breath as he stumbled back, over towards where Julie was standing facing the shorter bandit.
"Aaaaaahhh!" Shaun gasped out as he fell down to his knees, Julie turned around to see him kneeling down and his hands were brought up to his chest.
"Shaun what's wrong?" she asked as she looked around to see both bandit's beginning to recover.
"M-My hands, my hands!" he exclaimed as his eyes shut as he clutched his hands painfully.
"W-What's wrong with them?" she asked tentatively, she was worried at his sudden reaction.
He suddenly moved his hands away from his chest and tried to raise them up, Julie's eyes widened at the sight.
"O-Oh my god, Shaun!"
Protruding from between the knuckles on each of his hands were three small sharp, root looking spikes. From closer inspection they appeared to be made of bone, they were breaking through his skin, blood running down from the openings, Julie's hand came up to her mouth as she tried to comprehend what was happening.
"NNNNNYAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!" Shaun screamed, throwing his head back as the sharp spiked bones continued to force their way through his knuckles and out into the open as more blood pooled around his hands.
His screaming continued, now sounding less like a scream and more like the noise of some newly born creature. Julie's eyes could barely keep watch of the grotesque sight of the bones slowly pushing their way out with a sickening SNIIIIIIIIKKKTTTT as they slid through flesh. Shaun managed to muffle his screaming as he opened his eyes and stared down at his hands and the horrifying sight before him.
"My h-hands…M-My hands!" he screamed out again in confusion and pain as the bone spikes continued to push out until they were near nine inches and were still going.
"S-Shaun…What…?" Julie tried to speak but couldn't find words as she was fixated and disgusted at the sight.
The two bandits staring in fear and shock at the sight, the smaller one from behind Julie pulled out a pistol and aimed it up shakily, it wasn't clear who it was aimed at, but Shaun could somehow make out in his pain addled mind that it was only facing Julie.
Once again all he could seem to hear was his heartbeat as everything else drowned out.
Julie watched as the look of pain and confusion twisted to one of anger and his mouth turned into a sneer as a low growl erupted from his lips and he leapt towards her, she was about to bring up her hands to shield herself when she felt his arms grab onto hers and looked up to see him pull her behind him.
BANG...BANG...BANG...BANG
Julie's eyes widened in horror at the sound of the pistol, and for a moment she couldn't hear anything, she saw the bandits wordlessly yell something to each other before they scrambled to their feet and ran off in the opposite direction, making their way through the tree line.
A few moments later, and her hearing returned to her once again, and all she could hear was ragged breathing and grunts. She looked up to see Shaun standing their shakily with his back to her, the strange bone's jutting out of his knuckles still present as he slowly turned around to face her.
As soon as she did she gasped in horror and brought her hand up to her mouth to muffle a scream.
He had four bullet holes in his chest, all in different sections and all bleeding profusely through the white fabric, seeping through and spreading out.
Shaun seemed to look at her once more, his stance wavering before collapsing onto the ground, Julie's shouts of his name bringing nothing but darkness.
Many miles east, sitting in a carriage that was now leaving Munchkinland, was a tall oddly green colored girl wearing a blue ensemble with a matching blue knit hat and glasses. She looked up from the book she was reading to glance over to the opposite side where her father was chatting happily with her sister who was gushing and beaming at being able to attend Shiz.
Elphaba too was excited, though she knew the only reason she was going to Shiz was to look after her little sister, Nessarose, she felt that this would be a completely new experience for her.
Somehow she felt her life was about to change, for the better.
Halfway across Oz from that carriage, Galinda Upland was running around her room quickly, as she was trying to find her last bit of luggage. She already had all of her outfits, she had at least four for each day of the week, and that didn't include night ware or party dresses.
Several of the servants had already collected them all, except one that Galinda was taking down personally, a medium sized cream colored trunk on wheels and was quite heavy as a make-up trunk should be.
She was so excited that she was accepted into Shiz, though it was no surprise that she had been, she was an Upland after all, though she didn't say that out loud. Momsie never liked her using her name as an excuse for getting things.
Even if it was true.
Taking one last glance at her room, she reached down into her pocket and opened a small locket, smiling at the picture inside.
"Maybe if I'm lucky I'll see you there, big brother," she said before closing the locket and wheeling her trunk out the door quickly.
"Shiz university, get ready to be dazzled by the amazing, the beautiful, the Ozarific, Galinda Upland!" she cried making her way downstairs with a spring in her step.
"Oh god! Oh god! Oh god!" Julie exclaimed gripping her head as she began to breathe heavier, her chest heaving as she stared down at Shaun's still form, the sight of him sending her into hysterics.
Falling to her knee's she buried her head in her hands and let out a groan before looking up, seeing Shaun still lying there she felt her eyes beginning to moisten. They were only in Oz for two hours and now he was dead.
He was dead...
He'd been shot trying to protect her, even though she had annoyed him and got on his nerves he had jumped in front of a gun for her, and now he was dead-
Wait.
Julie looked to see a small wiggling sight under his blood soaked shirt, moving her hand over it she grimaced as she grabbed the wet fabric and pulled it up, and a small sound of something hitting the ground was heard.
Looking down she saw it was a bullet, followed by another, and another. Confused and freaked out, she gripped his shirt and lifted it up to see what had happened, and what she saw the bullet holes were closing, and the remaining bullet was pushed out of his flesh before that wound closed before her eyes.
He was...healing.
Glancing up she saw his eyes flutter softly, but he didn't awaken. Closing her eyes she tried to regain her composure, at least he wasn't dead, but that didn't mean he was necessarily ok.
Sniiiikkkt
Julie grimaced at hearing the sound and saw the sharp bone spikes...or claws...or whatever they were, sliding back into his hands between his knuckles.
Looking around, she saw like before, there was no one around in sight. But saw the tree line nearby leading into the forest.
After an agonizing thirty minutes, Julie leaned up against a tree and let out a breath. She had managed to drag Shaun's unconscious body into the forest area away from where they had been and lay him down on a blanket she had gotten from her bag. There was also a tent in her bag and other supplies, but she hadn't bothered to really look for anything else as she was too busy trying to get him into a resting position.
She was tired, he wasn't light and having to drag him as far as she did had exhausted her.
Giving a sigh she rubbed her eyes and stood up straight. Cracking her back slightly and preparing to walk back to where she had placed Shaun and their things. A minute later she was back where he was lying down, but her eyes suddenly shot open wider.
He wasn't there.
He wasn't where she had put him, Julie then frantically ran over to the blanket and looked around quickly. A few feet away his bloodied shirt was lying on the ground, like it had been torn off forcefully.
Oh no...what if a bear got him?! She thought gripping her head in her hands as she looked around.
"No, No that's silly. There's no bears around here...are there?!" she said aloud, her head whipping around.
However as she glanced back at his shirt, she saw footprints in the mud. That meant he must have woken up, he probably was looking for her.
Damn it! I shouldn't have left him alone! Julie mentally berated herself before taking off in the direction the footprints led.
She kept running, following the footprints until she came to a small stream. Stopping she leaned down and rested her hands on her knees as she tried to catch her breath. Julie was so tired, and the footprints seemed to disappear.
"Where are you...?" she said quietly, her expression shifting to one of desperation.
However she froze upon hearing a sound, something that seemed to drown out the sound of the water from the stream.
It was a growl.
She heard a low growl coming from somewhere behind her, she didn't know what it belonged to, but didn't sound friendly. Shaking slightly, she clenched her fists and tried to steady herself as she slowly began to turn, trying not to move quickly, afraid of startling whatever was nearby.
When she fully turned around, she saw nothing. Nothing was there, maybe it had gone away-
Her thoughts were instantly cut off as she heard the growl once again, before it became louder and the thing leapt out from a bush and tackled her, causing her to be thrown in the air slightly before landing harshly in the mud, she groaned out in pain before she looked up frantically to see what she was up against, her eyes widening at the sight of what had attacked her.
It was Shaun.
Shaun was standing-no he was crouching down, his upper body completely bare and his pants were covered in dirt and mud and were cut and tattered in some places.
The look on his face was one she hadn't seen before. His lip was curled up into a snarl as his eyes were glaring at her like she was a threat, his teeth were bared as he continued to let out a low growl.
Julie was shell-shocked as her eyes widened in shock, the look in his eyes it was wild and, dare she say it, predatory.
Before she could even attempt to speak, Shaun leapt across the distance and slammed into her, pushing her to the ground harshly, pressing his legs onto hers and grabbing her wrists. He had pinned her to the ground, and Julie instantly began to struggle, trying to throw him off of her. He held her down firmly, pressing her into the mud as he leaned down, growling at her loudly and causing her to stare back at him fearfully as he slowly began to lean down closer.
A million thoughts were running through her head, she tried to concentrate like before and use her fire, or tried to form words to speak to him, but somehow knew words wouldn't do anything at this point.
Her struggling came to a halt however as Shaun suddenly let out a vicious snarl and immediately the bone spikes, or more appropriately, bone claws, shot out from between his knuckles, tearing through the skin and causing some blood to drip down. From his position holding her arms, the claws were aimed right at her head.
Julie's eyes were now wide as she shook in his grip, her gaze locked into his.
"S-Shaun…"
His wild expression didn't falter as he let out a growl and moved his claws closer to her throat.
Julie: Yup, we're starting with a cliffhanger. *cackles*
Elphaba: WTF guys I got like no time on screen!
Galinda: Neither did I!
Julie: *facepalms*
Shaun: You got cameos so calm down, besides you'll be appearing more in the next chapter.
Fiyero: I didn't even get a cameo!
Elphaba: Cameos? This is OUR fandom!
Julie: THAT'S IT FOR NOW PLEASE REVIEW/FOLLOW/FAVE GOTTA GO BYE!
Shaun: Fiyero! *sounds of breaking glass is heard*
(Updates will not be on a usual timeline like my normal stories, but we will try to get them out as soon as possible. Shaun does most of the writing, except for the scenes we RP together, and I do a lot of the editing, grammar and such. I WILL be finishing So Much More Than Royal, don't worry. Updates on that will stay normal. The cover art was done my a commission artist on DeviantArt, and it is of my character and Elphaba. It may change in the future. Anywho, please review, follow, fave, etc. -Julie)