AN: I'm just really glad you're all directing your fury at Frex right now and not at me... although I think that will change after this chapter :3.

Let me warn you beforehand: as the title suggests, this chapter is dark, sad, and depressing. It made me depressed just writing it. I promise all will be well in the end, though - one way or another. Also, Elphaba's timeline goes faster in this chapter than the Shiz-timeline does, but I'm going to set that straight in the next chapter - it just seemed fitting to do it this way now.

Next update tomorrow - promise! Don't want to leave you all depressed for too long :).

By the way, not sure anymore who asked this some time ago, but yes, I confess, I got the baby-with-powers-in-the-womb-idea from Charmed :3. I love Charmed. And somehow, the unborn baby with powers wriggled its way into my story :P.

Failey: loved your parody song. Made me laugh my head off :D. Now the song's stuck in my head . (Oh, and FYI: you did spell irrelevant right earlier ^^.)

And I always forget that it's five hours earlier in the US... where most of you come from, I take it. It's just past midnight here right now - somehow, I usually update late at night. What can I say? I write best in my warm bed with my laptop on my... lap. That's probably why it's called a laptop :P. So that means it's like seven pm with most of you guys now... which is kinda weird. I posted a chapter in the morning once, and I was kind of disappointed that no one reviewed in the hours following, but the time difference explains it... you were probably all still asleep :3. Hihi.

I'm rambling. Let's get on with the story. Oh, and virtual Easter eggs for those who read this entire, way too long author's note :).

It took them a few clock-ticks to come to their senses and realise that Fiyero was lying in a rapidly growing pool of his own blood.

'Oh my Oz!' Galinda cried and Nessa gasped, clutching both hands over her mouth in horror. 'Fiyero! Is he all right?'

'Does he look all right?!' Galinda snapped, and Boq, who had kneeled down next to his friend, looked up with a pale face. 'I don't think he's breathing.'

Something in Galinda's mind clicked. Usually, she would have been among the first to panic, but in those cases there had always been someone – usually Elphie - to take the lead, to be the sensible one, to know what to do. Now, Boq and Nessa both seemed ready to either cry or faint, and Galinda knew she had to be the one to stay calm and practical this time. For Fiyero. For Elphaba.

'Move,' she commanded and Boq obliged immediately. She kneeled down next to Fiyero, suppressing the sinking feeling in her stomach. Fiyero wasn't breathing and she couldn't locate a heartbeat, either, but she didn't want to give up right away. Years ago, her father had taught her something she had never expected she would ever have to use. He had learned it from his father before him and he wanted Galinda to know how it was done, too, just in case; she was immensely grateful to him now that he had taught her how it was done.

She placed the palms of her hands on his chest and started pressing down on it, counting along under her breath. Nessa and Boq watched with wide eyes until Galinda looked up and snapped, 'Don't just stand there! Go and get help – he needs to get to a hospital!'

That seemed to snap them out of it and Boq immediately ran away in search for help. Nessa watched with wide eyes and a trembling lower lip as Galinda kept pressing on Fiyero's chest, then brought her mouth to his and breathed air into his lungs. She kept going, listening for a breath or a heartbeat every few clock-ticks. She pressed her ear against his chest and listened intently; then she finally released the breath she had been holding, looking relieved. 'I hear a heartbeat.'

Nessa wept at that, but Galinda wasn't finished by far. She started ripping off pieces of her frilly yellow dress – trying not to feel too horrified by that, since Fiyero's life was clearly more important than the life of her dress, even though it happened to be one of her favourites – and pressed them against the gun wound. It had entered his stomach and there was a lot of blood, but she could hear his breathing now, laboured, quick gasps, but breathing nonetheless. Her pretty face twisted in an expression of relief when she saw the ambulance carriage approaching. 'Over here!' she cried and a few ambulance brothers came rushing towards her. 'Please help him,' Galinda begged. Nessa could only cry, burying her face in Boq's shoulder as he knelt down next to her, murmuring reassuring things in her ear.

They took a taxi to follow the ambulance to the hospital. Fiyero was in surgery – that was all they would tell the three friends, since they weren't family. Galinda, still in practical mode, immediately wrote a letter to Fiyero's parents, sending it by express post, after which she tried to comfort Boq and Nessa and coax the nurses into telling her something, anything, about Fiyero's current condition, but they either didn't know or wouldn't tell her.

They waited all afternoon and evening, and it was nearly midnight when Fiyero's parents rushed in, with Paro close behind them. They all started talking at the same time. 'Where is he?' Lori asked breathlessly. 'Will he be all right?'

'Is he still alive?' Fiyero's father wanted to know. 'What happened?'

Paro was the first to look around and notice Elphaba's absence, connecting the dots. 'And where is Elphaba?' he asked quietly. He looked at Galinda, bracing himself against the answer to his next question. 'Was it Frex?'

She nodded mutely; then, she finally lost her composure and burst into tears. She didn't even have the energy to feel embarrassed when she flung herself in Paro's arms, clinging to him as she sobbed into his shirt, soaking it with her tears. He didn't mind, either; he wasn't sure what had happened, but watching Fiyero get shot and Elphaba – at least, that was what he assumed had happened – kidnapped, must have been awful for the blonde girl.

'Are you related to Fiyero Tiggular?' a nurse asked, causing everyone to jump to their feet – well, except for Nessa, of course. 'Yes, we're his parents,' Lori said quickly, gesturing towards herself and Hamold.

'And I'm his cousin,' Paro added. 'Where is he? Is he going to be okay?'

The nurse hesitated. 'You might want to come with me.'

'That doesn't sound good,' Nessa whispered to Boq. 'Does that sound good?'

'It doesn't,' he agreed softly, holding her hand tightly.

They waited for what felt like hours, while in reality, it was only a few minutes. Then Lori, Hamold and Paro returned. Lori was covering her mouth with her hand in horror and tears were streaming down her face; Hamold was trying to comfort her, but he seemed to be on the verge of crying himself, and Paro looked awfully pale. 'So?' Galinda asked in a small voice. 'What did they say?'

'They removed the bullet,' Hamold said quietly. When he didn't say anything else, Boq prodded gently, 'And?'

'He's lost a lot of blood,' Lori whispered, gripping her husband's hand so tightly her knuckles turned white. 'The bullet pierced his stomach and grazed his lung, and they tried their hardest, but…' She started weeping again, quietly, and Hamold pressed his lips to her hair and whispered something in her ear. Then he looked back at the youngsters gravely. 'They don't think he's going to make it.'

'You are insane,' Elphaba hissed furiously, struggling to break free of the ropes that were still tied around her wrists and ankles.

'Probably,' Frex agreed ominously. 'That doesn't change anything about your current situation, though.'

'I hate you,' she spat. 'You're trying to take my baby away. You shot Fiyero!'

'I'm not trying anything, Elphaba,' Frex sneered. 'I am going to take your baby. And your little boyfriend had it coming. He was annoying – I should have killed him weeks ago.'

Elphaba faltered and paled visibly, staring at him with wide eyes. 'Do you mean… Is he…'

Frex snorted. 'Please, child. Did you not see the pool of blood? I bet he bled to death even before they could get him to a hospital – I have good aim.' He collected his things and untied the ropes. He re-attached one of the ropes around her one wrist and tied the other end to the bedpost, so that she would be able to move throughout the room, but not any further. 'Don't bother trying to undo that,' he said with a dismissive wave of his hand as he noticed her starting to pick at the knots. 'Witch doctors are pretty useful if you pay them enough. The rope is enchanted – you need a special potion to be able to undo the knots.'

'You always said magic was sinful,' she commented softly, and he snorted. 'It's too late for that. You have brought sin upon our family, you forced me to sin in order to keep you from disgracing us… Now we're all sinful and we're all disgraced. It doesn't matter anymore – I'm past all that.' He walked towards the door. 'Don't even think about trying to escape,' he warned her. 'You'll never succeed, and even if you do, I'll find you, no matter what, and I know where to find your friends, too.' With that, he left the room, locking the door behind him.

Her legs were so shaky she felt like they could give in any minute, and so she sank down onto the bed, trying to wrap her mind around what Frex had said. Fiyero was… She couldn't comprehend it. He couldn't be dead, he just couldn't.

'I'm so sorry, Elyssah,' she whispered, tears forming in her eyes and silently dripping down her cheeks. 'I failed you. I couldn't protect your father… and now I'm afraid I can't protect you, either.'

She curled up on the bed, lying on her side in a fetal position, hands folded across her stomach. She could finally feel it swell a bit – she had been worried about her abdomen still being flat a few weeks before, but the pregnancy books, as well as Fiyero's mother, had assured her that it wasn't uncommon for skinny women to start showing only later in the pregnancy. She had been looking forward to that moment, where the love she shared with Fiyero would become visible not only to themselves, but to the entire world. Now, however, she resented it. Her soon-to-be baby bump would no longer represent everything she was lucky enough to have, but rather everything she had lost or would lose in the near future, and she didn't think she could bear that.

'Lys…' She curled further into herself, both hands pressing hard against her abdomen. 'I am so, so sorry to let you down…'

She couldn't feel the baby move, of course – she wouldn't be able to for a few more months; she felt something, however, and somehow, she knew it was Elyssah and it comforted her a little. She wasn't alone. She felt like falling apart, especially now that she knew Fiyero to be dead, but she had to stay strong. She had to drag herself through this and save herself and her unborn child. She owed Elyssah that much and somehow, she found a little bit of her old strength again. She sat up gingerly, determined not to wallow in self-pity for too long. 'My promise is still standing,' she whispered to her stomach. 'I'm not sure anymore if everything will ever be okay again, but I will try everything in my power to protect you. I'm just not sure if I can, with your Daddy…' She choked on the word 'gone' and her voice trailed away. She would not allow herself to think about Fiyero right now. She knew Frex was most certainly right about him being dead by now – there had been so much blood, no one could survive that… but she'd have to grieve later. Right now, she needed to figure out a way to get out of here. But first she had to find out where 'here' was, exactly.

She sighed and lay back down on her back, staring at the ceiling, trying to block Fiyero from her thoughts. The harder she tried, though, the more thought of him forced themselves on her, and she squeezed her eyes shut. She felt strange all of a sudden, faint; she quite literally felt her power drain away and she panicked for a moment, afraid that something was wrong with the baby, but then she recognised the feeling. It was quite similar to the time when Elyssah had tapped into her powers to save them… but what was she trying to do now, then?

'What are you up to, little one?' Elphaba whispered to her unborn daughter. 'Are you trying to do something? Get us out of here?'

An image flickered before her eyes for a moment and she gasped as she recognized it as a vision, but it was blurry and it only lasted for a clock-tick, gone so fast she hadn't even been able to identify what it had been exactly that she had seen. 'Lys? Are you trying to show me something?' she said softly, propping herself up against the pillows to sit up straight. She could still feel the baby tapping into her powers, but it didn't worry her anymore. She wasn't sure what Elyssah was doing, but it didn't appear to have any effect now, anyway. And so she went back to not thinking about Fiyero – causing her to think of nothing but him for the next hour, until she gave in, hid herself underneath the blankets and cried herself to sleep.

Finding out where she was didn't prove to be easy, as she discovered in the days thereafter. Frex kept her locked in this one dark room, with nothing but a bed in it; there weren't any windows, and no matter how hard she tried to break down the one door or even one of the walls, none of them budged, not even when she released her powers on them . She suspected Frex had had that witch doctor of his cast that anti-magic spell on this room as well.

She had lost control a few times, sparks flying all around as she threw her magic at the walls and the door again and again, yelling curses at the top of her lungs, just because being angry was so much easier than being sad. If she cried now, she would break down, and so she channelled her emotions into her magic, causing her to have outbursts more and more often. Still to no avail, though. She was locked up and she remained so.

The only times Frex came to visit was when he brought her food, dry bread and water two times a day, and he never left without taunting her. He always brought up Galinda, or Boq or Nessa or, quite often, Fiyero, and he would say the nastiest things about them – things that caused her to fly off the handle again, but his witch doctor spell did its work well; her magic couldn't affect him. One day, when he had said especially mean things about Fiyero, she had literally flung herself at him, giving up on magic and resorting to physical violence instead, screeching and biting and clawing at him like a mad cat. He had hurriedly disappeared, once again locking the door tightly behind him. She would have to spend the next day without any food.

That night she cried herself to sleep, as she usually did now, and as always, she was haunted by horrible nightmares about her friends and Frex and Elyssah and Fiyero – mostly Fiyero – all night long, causing her to bolt upright in bed in the darkest hours of the night, sweating profusely and panting as if she had been running for hours. She would curl up into herself again, comforting herself by softly talking to Elyssah, which somehow made her feel better for a moment, but she knew she couldn't go on like this. She felt as if she was being pulled at from two different sides; part of her just wanted to curl up in a corner and die, so at least she would be able to be with Fiyero again, while a small voice in the back of her brain screamed at her that she couldn't give up, that she had to keep fighting, for her daughter. She knew that voice to be right, of course, but it was so incredibly hard right now.

She could feel Elyssah's power build slowly inside of her. Her daughter still tried, every now and then, to show her the vision she apparently wanted Elphaba to see, but she didn't appear strong enough yet – she couldn't come through. But as the weeks passed and Elyssah – plus Elphaba's stomach – slowly grew bigger, Elphaba could feel her unborn daughter getting stronger. Perhaps soon she would be able to show her that vision after all.

She herself wasn't doing well, however. She was still trying to stay strong, doing her very best, but every day, a little of her old strength and willpower seemed to crumble down. She was a ghost of her former self, awfully skinny – especially given her current condition – and hollow-eyed. Her magic outbursts had seized; instead, she just lay on the bed now, staring at the ceiling or the wall, talking to Elyssah as if to prevent herself from going crazy, although she strongly suspected she was heading in that direction anyway. The more she thought about it, the more hopeless her situation seemed. And every time she thought about Fiyero dying, her heart broke – no, shattered, into tiny little pieces - all over again. The only thing keeping her from dying right now, the only thing that kept her going – if you could call it that – was her daughter. She started to fear, however, that it wouldn't be enough.

She wasn't sure how much longer she could hold up before she would break… for good this time.

'Mr. and Mrs. Tiggular?'

The royal couple turned to face the doctor who had come up to them and was now looking at them with a grave expression on his face. 'I'm very sorry, sir, ma'am. We've tried everything, but your son doesn't respond to the treatment. The bullet has done too much damage and he has lost too much blood; there's nothing we can do for him anymore.'

Lori buried her face in her husband's shoulder, crying and Hamold looked at the doctor with wet eyes. 'How much longer?'

The doctor hesitated. 'Half an hour… an hour at most. I think it would be wisest for you to go and say goodbye to him right now. Even though he won't be conscious, that will be easier than when he has already…'

'We'll do that,' Paro cut him off rather rudely. 'Thank you.'

The doctor nodded, flashed them a sympathetic smile and left them. Paro took a deep breath and looked around at Fiyero's friends and family. They were all shocked for a moment, but that changed soon enough.

Paro tried his hardest to maintain his composure as everyone around him broke down. He took Galinda's hand and squeezed it, then looked around at the others. 'Come on,' he said softly. 'Let's go say goodbye.'

Told ya.

If you kill me now, you won't find out how I'm going to solve this. Take out your anger on Frex instead! :D

I should do a oneshot parody on a bunch of Wicked fans (including BlueD, Wicked4Life and, of course, Failey) hunting down and killing Frex. That could be interesting :D.