Fiyero sat slumped in what he learned was called "the back seat of a car." He held Galinda firmly, but made sure she was comfortable. Somehow, the inside of the car was the perfect temperature, while the outside was no doubt much warmer. But Fiyero had been witness to, and target of, magic, so he felt he was taking the entire situation well in stride.

"Thank you again, sir. If I may ask, though, why did you decide to pick me up when no one else would?" Fiyero asked cautiously but politely.

"My rule of thumb when dealing with hitch-hikers; if they look crazy, they ain't crazy. If they look normal, keep on driving."

The old man, an easy-going fellow named Phillip, drove them towards the city at a rate much quicker than he could have walked there. They'd stopped at some sort of refueling station, and the man's wife, named Mertle, was kind enough to buy Galinda some milk from the small market attached.

Thankfully, Galinda seemed contented now. Fiyero dreaded the moment he had to change a messy diaper, for he had nothing to wash the cloth diaper with, and he didn't want to be a further burden on this nice old couple. Plus, stains and smells tended to set into burlap hands.

Galinda was quiet, but batted at the straw sticking out from under her father's hat. He smiled.

"That is a lovely little girl you have there, Mister…?" Mertle asked him gently, so as not to be too loud and spook the baby.

"Tiggular. Fiyero Tiggular," he said, annunciating his name. "And thank you."

"Oh, my, why is she so red, dear?"

"She's a Quadling, ma'am," Fiyero said, matter-of-factly. "At least, her mother is."

"Oh, but where is the poor dear's mother?" she asked in a saddened voice, not showing if she knew what a Quadling was or not.

"Unfortunately, we were separated shortly after we got to this land, and-- ."

"Oh? That's too bad," piped up Phillip from the driver's seat. "You say you just got hereabouts? Where are you from?"

Fiyero took a moment to think over his answer, but decided these folks were trustworthy enough to know the truth. "Oz, sir."

"Australia, eh?" Phillip said a little too loudly. "I was stationed there when I was in the army, y'know. Just before shipping out to Korea."

"Uhhh, really? How… fascinating." He decided not to correct him on his most peculiar pronunciation of Oz.

"Oh, Phil, don't bore the boy with your old war stories…"

"I'm not boring the boy; anyone would love to hear such tales of adventure and heroism, wouldn't you, Figaro?"

Once again, Fiyero didn't bother correcting him, but rather said he'd love to hear the stories.

"We, my company and I, were to be stationed in Seoul. We shipped out in '51. Me and the good ol' boys left our ladies behind to wait for us. Mertle here was a dear, always sending me cookies and love letters. The letters were a little stale, but she makes the best macaroons. The boys would always try to buy them offa me, tradin' me cigarettes or girlie magazines or unused shells, which didn't turn out for this one fella named Chuck, when he ran out of ammo and got himself shot by one of them Korean crazies 'cause he got too close. Haha! He was not the sharpest tool in the shed…"

-----

Samantha knelt on her living room floor, sweeping the last of the broken glass up. She wasn't really thinking about what she was doing, her body was just moving on its own. She was thinking. Thinking about what the hell had just happened.

Glinda broke the news of their disappearance as gently as she could have-- as anyone could have. Elphaba had been quiet at first, but not solemn or pensive. Rather, it was the kind of quiet there is before a storm.

And what a storm there was. Elphaba's face had contorted in anger, she let out a shriek of rage and her hands shot out, and instantly, almost every item of glass or porcelain in the apartment had shattered, including the French doors to the balcony. She'd then said something in an odd language, which apparently put a hell of a whammy on Samantha's coat rack, because next thing she or Glinda knew, Elphaba was on it and out the window.

Samantha threw the glass, and the dustpan, in the garbage and shuffled over to the couch, collapsing onto it and letting out a slow breath.

Glinda was standing on the balcony, tracking the retreating form of Elphaba on the coat rack.

"Elphie, be reasonable! This is going to get you nowhere!" Glinda shouted. "Elphaba, get your green self over here right now!"

"Why don't you follow her in that bubble thing?"

Glinda turned to look at Samantha, surprised. "So you do know who we are?"

"Doesn't everyone?" Samantha nodded. "Glinda the Good Witch of the North, and the Wicked Witch of the West, whose name is apparently 'Elphaba,' and who has just hexed and stolen my coat rack."

"Oh, then you only know part of the story. She's not really a Wicked Witch, she's just distraught right now. When she gets back you'll see, you don't have to-- ."

"I'm still trying to decide whether or not this is all a hallucination, despite what just happened and the various cuts the glass gave me, so you don't have to worry about me taking any kind of decisive action."

"She'll come back in a bit, and I'm sure she'll help you replace anything she broke, Sammy." Glinda sat next to her on the couch. "Can I call you Sammy?"

Sam put her feet up on the coffee table. "Sure, go for it, Uncle Arthur." The cat, Streaky, leapt up onto her lap, and she stroked her fur down, not seeing Glinda's confused and annoyed look. "This is so crazy. How can you be sure she'll come back? Why don't you go after her?"

"She'll come back. She's very level-headed. Usually." Glinda frowned. "And believe me, I'd go after her if I could."

"Can't you use your magic?"

Glinda's shoulders slumped. "No."

"How can she use hers if you can't use yours?" Samantha asked, confused.

Glinda took a deep breath and sighed. "The truth is...I… I'm completely useless. I'm a fraud. I can't use magic at all. It was all illusions and trickery… Lies, really… It's the one thing I've always wanted, but never gotten. The bubble was an idea I had, and Oz's old Wizard built it for me. I can't even change a frock into a ballgown." She smiled sadly at her admission, but fondly at the memory.

"Bummer. The one thing I've always wanted but never gotten was a pony."

"I had seven growing up in Gillikin."

Samantha took a moment to look Glinda over. She looked like any other person, and, Sam had to admit, knowing she had no powers made it a little easier to accept her. "So Elphaba is really green-skinned?"

"Yes."

"That's nuts. Aside from the skin, she looks normal."

Glinda's heart sank. "You mean… there aren't any green people here?"

"No, why would there be?"

"Elphaba's father was from this world, but her mother was from Oz. We figured that might be why she's green; that there might be other green people here. That maybe she could just blend in and live a new life." Glinda looked hopeful. "Are there green people in Kansas?"

"No, Kansas and Chicago have pretty much the same, uh, 'colour range' of people." Sam was silent for a moment, then smiled slightly. "This is so nuts."

"What does that mean?"

"What?" Sam asked.

"That word. 'Nuts.' You've used it a couple of times," Glinda said, "and I don't think you were talking about cashews."

Sam laughed. "It's slang. It means crazy or weird."

"Oh." Glinda paused before continuing. "At least we speak the same language, by some miraculous coincidence."

"Well, with a few minor discrepancies, yeah." Sam stood up and walked to the window, looking down at the street, where, thankfully none of the glass had fallen onto anyone; most of it had been blown inward. Then she squinted at the sky. "I don't see my coat rack."

"Oh, I'm sure she's long gone by now. You're taking this all pretty well, I think."

Sam waved her off. "Except for the initial shock, of course. But I was raised to believe that just because something's different, doesn't necessarily mean it's bad. You have to make yourself gauge the situation first." She rubbed the back of her neck. "And, call it a hunch, but I feel like things are gonna be mighty different as a result of you people in my life."

"In your life?" Glinda asked. "Surely you don't think we're going to stay here and bother you?"

"Aren't you?" Sam asked, seriously. "I mean, you've got, I assume, no money, and more than likely no clue how things work in the world outside of Oz. Unless you've got a movie about someone from Oz coming here already."

Glinda shook her head. "What's a movie?"

"Ehhh… Never mind. I'm just asking if you've thought out a plan."

Glinda shook her head again, this time a little embarrassed. "Not really."

"Well, you say you want to go to Kansas. First, though, why don't you start out in Chicago. I'll even help you out."

"You really don't have to do that."

"Yeah, yeah," Sam waved her off, sounding defeated, probably by her own conscience. "You can stay with me if you want. It's no problem."

Glinda put her hands up. "Really, you don't have to. I would hate us to be a burden."

"You're already a disaster. I figure you can't get much worse," Sam said with a laugh. "If you're going to 'start a new life' or whatever, I figure Chicago would be a good run. It's a big city, yeah, but not so much as LA or New York, thank God. That place is crazy."

"You mean nuts?" Glinda asked with a smile.

"Yeah." Sam laughed. "Lordy, I feel like I'm John Conner and you're the Terminator."

"What's that?"

"Don't worry about it for now," Samantha said, not feeling up to explaining the history of motion pictures. She leaned back into the sofa. "Hey. While we wait for Elphaba to bring back my coat rack, why don't we try to get to know a little more about each other and our lives and stuff."

"Alright. What should we start with?"

"Well… Do you really regularly break out into song in Oz?"

A/N: Another chapter done. Yeah, she takes things pretty well in stride, but a lot of people have been, for lack of a better word, desensitized to freakish happenings, so I figure this is a pretty realistic reaction. Especially in Chicago. You see a lot of wierd stuff, particularly downtown, and you just take it in stride. I'm the only person who ever stops to actually look at things and examine strange happenings... Eh... Guess where I'm from, you guys...

Did you all get the Terminator joke and the Bewitched reference?

Now, this is the last chapter I'm uploading before school starts for me on the 29th (GAH!). During the semester either there will be frequent updates with shorter chapters, or updates about every 7-10 days with chapters at least a thousand words in length. Hopefully. Probably.

Now a couple of review responses:

reefer7, eLpHaBaFaBaLaElPhIeFaE, Sinfulpurgatory: Yeah, the musical opening up is Wicked. Of course. But I haven't decided if they're actually gonna go and see it yet. The musical plays into the story, though. And to eLpHaBaFaBaLaElPhIeFaE, there was the next chapter, just to keep you from doing anything crazy from waiting… Haha! That review made me laugh.

Lyndalion16: Your upset I called you a schmuck? Well, you killed Glinda! It's kind of a schmucky thing to do, doncha think? Ahhh, but thank you for reviewing.

MamaJeanie: Ha! I was actually thinking of doing that! Get out of my head! Ahhhhh!

Oh! And if anyone knows HTML or any of that nifty website design whozits, tell me! I've got a nifty "Limited"-related surprise all lined up! But I need help with making a webpage!

Now, I feel I should tell you all, I have seen the future. And the future looks good for those who review, so if you don't want to suck and be the bane of humanity, review.