Chapter NINE

All the flying monkeys were making their way back to the Wicked Wizard of the West's castle, their unwilling cargo in tow. Well mostly unwilling.

"Hello Mr Cloud," said Stephanie blithely as they flew along, "I must say, you do an excellent flying monkey impersonation."

"You're not very bright are you?" asked Nathan, arching an eyebrow at her as he navigated the skies.

"No," said Stephanie with a sad sigh, "I'm really not."

"Boy but you're heavy," grunted Brady as he was forced to flap his wings extra hard to get even half the height the other monkeys were getting with their hostages.

"It's the suit!" exclaimed Nicole indignantly.

"Oh okay," said Brady with a roll of his eyes, "It's the suit, sure thing."

"This dog smells funky," said Chad in concern as he held Pookie at arm's length, "What's up with that?"

"You don't want to know," said Sami with a grimace even as she was squirming in Stefano's grasp.

"I keep telling you it wasn't that kind of flap!" said Nicole in annoyance.

"Put me down Stefano!" Sami ordered him, struggling mightily.

"Alright," he said with a smirk, "You're a very stupid girl."

"I mean down on the ground," Sami said, glaring up at him.

"On the ground or in the air you are still a stupid little girl," Stefano tutted at her, "You rejected my son and have brought pain upon everyone."

"Oh right!" Sami snapped, "It's my fault that your son is a sociopath, right Stefano, sure thing!"

"It is your fault that his heart was shattered into a thousand pieces and he became a lost soul, wandering aimlessly through this life," said Stefano, not backing down.

"I, ah-" Sami stammered, wondering if she could afford to believe what Stefano was saying, "EJ never loved me, he never needed me, not really – it was just an obsession."

"My Elvis only loved you, only needed you," said Stefano, "What is love but an obsession anyway – able to see past faults and flaws and still want only them eh?"

"EJ and I are none of your business Stefano!" Sami bit out angrily.

"Maybe," said Stefano with a shrug as they arrived at their destination, "But you and Elvis are each other's business and it is time to face up to that."

Before Sami could give an indignant reply to that Stefano dropped her at the feet of Kenny, the Wicked Wizard of the West and flew off out the window he'd just brought them through.

"Oh no!" wailed Chloe emotionally as they were all dumped in front of Kenny in his lair, "This is bad, this is very bad!"

She turned to look at the others fearfully.

"How do I look?" she asked, putting a self conscious hand to her mane.

It was stuck out at all odd angles, totally uncoifed by the wind on the flight over to Kenny's lair.

"You look like a bug that's just hit the windscreen of a car," said Nicole unsympathetically.

"A very pretty bug though," chimed in Stephanie, trying to help as always.

"I don't want to die looking ugly!" Chloe wailed, her bottom lip trembling.

"No one is going to die," said Sami firmly, over all of this now.

She marched up to Kenny and glared up at him.

"Let my people go!" she ordered him, "You're not real, just a figment of my imagination so I say let us go Kenny – you have no power here."

Kenny gave her a bored look and without taking his eyes from Sami pointed his wizard's wand directly at Nicole where one of her arms promptly fell off.

"Oh crap!" said Nicole in dismay as she looked down at her flailing arm that was now on the ground.

Sami looked at Nicole and the arm that used to belong to her and decided that she just had to concentrate harder.

"It's my dream and I'm just going to dream your powers away!" declared Sami determinedly, her eyes narrowing in concentration.

Kenny pointed his wand at Nicole and her other arm dropped off now.

"Oh come ON !" she said in exasperation, "In what way is this fair exactly?"

"It's alright Nicole," said Sami, suddenly remembering her story, "I've got this covered."

She grabbed a jug of water that she could see sitting on the window sill by the monkeys and threw it all over Kenny.

"Melt you crazy bastard melt!" she declared triumphantly.

Kenny didn't melt though, just looked down at his soaked tunic and then back at Sami, decidedly unimpressed.

"Whoopsie," said Sami, wrinkling her nose.

Kenny pointed his wizard's wand yet again and this time one of Nicole's legs dropped off.

"For the love of god somebody please make her stop!" begged Nicole frantically as she hopped around on her one remaining leg.

"You know it's pretty funny when it's happening to someone else," commented Philip thoughtfully as all the flying monkey sat together, having hung around for the show.

"Right," agreed Brady, nodding in agreement, "It really is."

"You killed my beautiful Ra-Ra and for that you must die Sami Brady," said Kenny, dramatically raising up his arms.

"Uh oh," said Chloe with a grimace, "This is not going to end well."

"I'm not loving the middle either!" Nicole snapped as she hopped about, trying to keep her balance.

"But can't we all just be friends?" piped up Stephanie hopefully, "We don't have to fight do we?"

"She killed my Ra-Ra!" roared Kenny, "Sami and her friends will die!"

"In that case I just want to make it clear that we're not really with her," said Chloe, pointing at Sami, "We just met and if anything she is more of an acquaintance but definitely not a friend."

"Thank you for that Chloe," said Sami flatly.

"Honey you're screwed," said Chloe brightly, "A real friend wouldn't want to take others down with her would she?"

Just then Gavin put in an appearance, sticking out of the side of Stephanie's head and looking around himself with interest.

"Sq-squirrel!" stammered Kenny, his eyes going wide with fear, "Kill it, kill it now!"

Sami could see how scared Kenny was of the small creature and quickly took advantage of the situation. She grabbed Gavin from Stephanie's head and threw it at Kenny, hoping that it would create a diversion so they could make good their escape. Gavin for his part got quite the fright from being flung across the room unexpectedly and did what squirrels and most things for that matter do when they are frightened, he peed.

"NO!" screamed Kenny as the little creature clinging to his chest made with the waterworks, "NO, NO, NOOOO!"

All of a sudden Kenny began to smoke and then seem to get smaller.

"He's melting!" Chloe gasped in disbelief as a screaming Kenny began to become a puddle on the floor.

"Squirrel pee really?" asked Brady as everyone looked on in disbelief, "That is one specific ass Achilles' heel I gotta say."

"It makes more sense than water," pointed out Nicole laconically.

At last there was nothing left of Kenny but a sticky puddle on the floor, Gavin having scampered back to the safety of Stephanie's head as quickly as he could.

"You killed Kenny," said Chloe wide eyed, staring at Sami in wonder.

"I ah, um," Sami struggled to find the words, "I guess I did."

"Do you know what this means?" asked Philip slowly, eyeing the oozing muck on the floor that used to be their boss.

"That I wish it wasn't my turn on the roster to do the floors this week?" offered up Dan with a grimace.

"It means we're free," said Philip, a slow smile coming to his lips, "We don't have to do what Kenny says anymore."

"But I thought Dayz couldn't survive without Kenny?" fretted Brady.

"Dayz as we know it can't survive," agreed Philip, a light coming into his eyes, "But now that he's gone we can make a new future for ourselves – one where we don't look like idiots all the time, one where proper stories with proper characters in them can be told and we're not forced to speak crap all the time."

"Do you know what we should do next?" asked Nathan, sitting a little straighter, "We should fly over to see Gary and Dena and run them far from Dayz while we're at it. With Kenny gone they'll have no power over us anymore."

The other flying monkeys chorused their agreement and in a flap of wings and fur they were all out the window, on their way to see the junior wizards.

"Time to give them a taste of their own medicine!" Philip crowed as they flew away, "Crap for flinging on standby guys!"

"That is going to be one ugly, ugly showdown," said Chloe with a shake of her head as they all watched them leave, "Not to mention a stinky one."

"So now can we go to the Emerald City so I can get out of here?" asked Sami impatiently, stepping over the goo that had once been Kenny.

"Haven't you forgotten something?" asked Nicole in ire as she was still forced to hop about, "I've been turned into a swizzle stick!"

"But on the up side you've lost weight," said Stephanie brightly, "That's a good thing right?"

"Someone club her to death with one of my arms," Nicole ordered them menacingly, "Right now!"

"Oh," said Stephanie looking taken aback, "How rude."