A/N: And we're back with another chapter of my escalating mental breakdown!
A hearty thank-you to everyone who viewed, reviewed, favourited and followed: with any luck, this will continue to live up to the standards of insanity I have established thus far, but as always, you'll have to be the judge. Feel free to email and tell all about the inevitable typos that creep in at 2 in the morning.
Anyway, without further ado, the latest chapter: read, review and above all, enjoy!
Disclaimer: Wicked is still not mine. Also, there's a Farscape shout-out in this chapter; if there are any fans in the audience, see if you can spot it.
"There's only one solution to this, isn't there?" said Elphaba quietly. "You're going to have to kill me as soon as the Empress is dead: the moment she's finished burning down to the last ember, you'll have to put a bullet in my head."
Dr Kiln's eyes darted anxiously about the room. "Not necessarily," he said, but without conviction. "Maybe, if we can get hold of Dr Lintel's research, we might yet be able to create an interdimensional portal back to your world and get you home before the Empress can take over your mind. Once you're home, dimensional synchronization will no longer be in effect and you'll be safe."
"Kiln, be honest with me: unless you somehow managed to steal some of his papers before you defected, the research we need is probably going to be somewhere in Unbridled Radiance, if not actually right in the middle of Exemplar. Does that sound likely do you, doctor?"
"…it's highly likely, yes."
"In other words, we'd have to somehow track down the research in the middle of a battle with the Empress and all her soldiers. And assuming that his research papers actually have any information on how to create the kind of portal we need, we've actually got to build it next – and I'm comfortably certain we can't do that in the middle of a battle, so it'll have to wait until the Empress is dead. We don't know how long it'll take to complete the portal and we don't know how long it'll take for the Empress's personality to take over my mind, but assuming we're lucky enough to get me out of here before she takes over completely, what if the changes that have been made to my personality remain even after I'm free from the synch?"
Kiln hung his head in dismay. "…that is a possibility," he admitted.
"Then why bother going through with all this when it's clearly not even going to be remotely possible? I'm going to die, Kiln; I have to die in order to stop the Empress for good-"
"No, you don't!" Glinda yelled; she'd been deathly silent for the last few minutes, but now she was on her feet and ranting, her voice accelerating faster and faster as she grew ever-more panicked. "There's still other ways around this: maybe we can get the Mistress of Mirrors to steal the research instead and we can have a portal ready before we even get anywhere near Exemplar. Or maybe, if the problem's down to the two of you being too much alike, then maybe we can make the Empress different – or we can make you different, or something like that; I mean, I don't know how we'll do that, but there has to be another way!"
"Sometimes there isn't another way, Glinda. I'm sorry, but that's just the way it is." An idea struck her and she voiced it almost without thinking. "But what if we could use the sync to our advantage?"
"How do you mean?"
"Well, if the Empress dies, her consciousness is reborn in my brain; what if I could pull the same trick on her? We've already established that the sync works both ways, so what if I died and-"
"NO," bellowed Glinda.
"Look, I'm just suggesting-"
"ABSOLUTELY NOT."
"You've learned too much from me when it comes to turning down ideas, you know that? Kiln, is there any chance that we could make this idea work?"
Kiln sucked in a deep breath. "It's not impossible," he said at last, "But I really wouldn't recommend it. We're dealing with a highly experimental field of research at this point, and we don't know all the subtleties of dimensional synchronization; there've been a few indications that native incarnations may trump the newcomer in terms of synch resistance, so there's a distinct possibility that – if you actually went through with this possibility – nothing would happen."
"So we can drop the topic?"
"Yes, Glinda, we can consider the topic shelved until further notice."
"Thank Lurline for that…"
The Mentor coughed for attention, sounding uncannily like a very old and extremely rusty axe being forced through a stubborn tree trunk. "I think we might be overlooking a more immediate problem," she said. "For one thing, we still need to focus on how we can kill the Empress ahead of preventing her from taking over Elphaba's mind. However, in this respect, we may have an opportunity to kill two birds with one stone."
"What do you mean?"
"Up until now, the Empress has been able to retreat from battle at the very moment she was confronted by a threat that could actually kill her, and given the resources we'd to commit to such an assassination attempt, we run the risk of leaving the Deviant Nations dangerously ill-defended. However, this latest setback offers us an unexpected opportunity: if we can lure the Empress into a private duel with Elphaba, we can ensure that both participants die."
Glinda blinked in confusion. "Are you joking?" she demanded.
"Not in the slightest. One of the many potential dangers of Witch-Crystal is its instability, especially in the case of overdoses."
"I know, Elphaba told me. But why is that so important right now?"
"The instability isn't limited to the effect on the user: if we were to deliberately provide too much of the drug right before the battle, we might be able to guarantee that the Empress would become collateral damage in the resulting backlash."
"You want Elphaba to kill herself? After all that she's done for you, you want her to blow herself up just so you don't have to go to the trouble of finding another way?"
"If it means stopping Unbridled Radiance once and for all? Absolutely."
"I can't believe what I'm hearing…"
"Would that work?" asked Elphaba, too curious to be worried.
Kiln took a deep breath, visibly mulling things over. "It's possible," he said at last. "Overdoses of Orecantheum accelerate the crystallization effect, and if not suppressed, it can cause catastrophic injuries: partially-transmuted organs shut down, crystal growths within the skull result in brain damage, and if the heart isn't crystalized immediately it can often be shredded when the blood tunrs to crystal as well. But in the case of extreme overdoses…" He grimaced.
"Well, don't leave us in suspense! What happens?"
"The user's body is completely – and fatally – transmuted into crystal, often in less than ten seconds. Then it begins amplifying the subject's magic as intended, but without a conscious mind to control it, the thaumaturgical energy runs rampant. The fact that most users are on the verge of casting some hopelessly overambitious spell when the crystallization catches up with them doesn't help. With the amplification self-sustaining, too much energy is compressed into a body unable to contain all of it, triggering an explosion. Everything within fifty yards of the user will be instantly incinerated; beyond that, the thermal damage will be significant, and magical radiation will poison the area for many years afterwards."
"And that'll be enough to kill the Empress?"
"An explosion generating temperatures in excess of three million degrees Fahrenheit? One would hope."
"Then why haven't you tried this before, genius?!"
"Because," said the Mentor, "we haven't had anyone with potential enough to justify amplifying their powers with Witch-Crystal. More importantly, we haven't had a situation justifying it: up until now, there's too much of a risk to us, too much security defending her, too many chances for her to escape, etcetera. But you, Elphaba… oh, she hates you: she arranged for a trap to be set specifically for you; she went so far as to lead the invasion force in Loamlark just for a chance to kill you in battle; she even set up a portal on the border just so she'd have a chance to duel you again. If she were to find you within her reach, she would want to eliminate you personally – giving you the perfect opportunity to get her close enough to strike. For example, let's say we have the Mistress of Mirrors send you right into Exemplar-"
"That might be asking too much, Mentor," Kiln warned. "Infiltration missions that deep into enemy territory run the risk of discovery: Unbridled Radiance may end up declaring all-out war on the Mistress of Mirrors if they find out that she helped us – and as formidable as she may be, she'll be no match for the Empress herself. We can't afford to lose her as an ally."
"And we won't, not if this operation goes entirely according to plan – and I've no doubt she can guarantee it. While the Empress is distracted with fighting you, Elphaba, we'll magically cage her as subtly as we can, and then you can take the overdose; in a single stroke, we decapitate her empire and prevent any chance of her being reborn in your mind."
"No, no, no, no," Glinda insisted. "There has to be another way! Maybe we can sneak a bomb into Exemplar – I mean, I'm a shapeshifter, it shouldn't be too hard for me or one of the other League members to-"
Kiln shook his head. "Unbridled Radiance developed method of sniffing out shapeshifters many years ago – one of the reasons why they had to flee the country in the first place, in fact. True, Leoverus and the others have come up with a few techniques for stymying detection, but that's not always a guarantee."
"What about the Dolls? The Hellion once managed to open a portal into Greenspectre palace and sent a few Dolls in to kidnap Dorothy. What if we try the same thing, only instead of sending a squad of kidnappers, we just send one of them into Exemplar with a bomb?"
"Not possible at present," said the Mentor with a shake of her head. "The Empress has shielded her palace, her capital city and her empire with a vast array of enchantments to keep out unfriendly teleportation and other hostile magic; even the Mistress of Mirrors would struggle to send someone through the mirrors over there. To put things into perspective, the Hellion only managed to get through our shields through sheer strength of magic; you really think Dorothy can manage the same feat at her current age?"
"Then how can the Mistress of Mirrors do it so easily?"
"Because mirrors, shadows and echoes exist within the shield already: they offer her a toehold beyond the reach of the shielding enchantments in much the same way that a teleporter charm would. But even those aren't fallible; there are still methods of blocking the Mistress of Mirrors' powers, and teleportation charms can be detected the moment they activate. Once again, no option of using them – not if you plan on being stealthy."
Glinda opened her mouth as if to say something else, but for the moment, it seemed as if she was out of ideas.
In desperation, she turned to Elphaba: "Elphie, say something!" she burst out. "You can't just play along with this – they're going to send you to your death! Doesn't that mean anything you? Can't you think of something else?!"
But for once, Elphaba had nothing to say: even if she'd known enough about the situation to think of another option, the sense of inevitability about the whole thing was smothering her in that moment; she honestly couldn't think of a way out of this – and frankly, she wasn't sure if there was one. Maybe she'd gotten used to getting ready to throw her life away, but it still seemed strange that the sense of impending doom was getting to her this time.
"You know the alternative," said the Mentor darkly. "We can either end the war in single stroke, or we can see it start all over again. Either way, your friend is gone forever. Do you really want to see your friend corrupted into the Empress – as mine was?"
"There has to be another way!"
"Sometimes there isn't, Glinda. Sometimes, the only route ahead lies in shadows and blood: it can't be avoided; it can't be dismissed; it can only be accepted."
"And maybe you're just addicted to the sound of your own voice – you ever think of that?"
In spite of herself, Elphaba almost smiled: quite apart from the fact that Glinda was nothing short of adorable when she was angry and upset, she'd just borrowed an insult that Elphaba had once fired at her back in their early days at Shiz, during one of their many, many arguments. Frankly, Elphaba wasn't sure if she should be amused or proud.
Meanwhile, the Mentor was giving Glinda a look that could have scorched the paint off a battleship, but that point, Glinda was too frantic to pay much attention: "You don't really pay attention to any of the better possibilities anymore," she plunged on. "You've gotten so used to that one approach that you're ignoring all the others you could be taking. I mean, you haven't even sat down and thought about this: you just brainstormed a solution off the top of your head! Can't we at least take a little time to do some research?"
"She has a point, Mentor," Kiln chimed in. "Er, not about being addicted to the sound of your own voice, I mean – we could be doing some more research: it's entirely possible we haven't completely exhausted the potential solutions that the Mistress of Mirrors and the Amorphous League could offer us. Perhaps, if we had just a little more time to mull things over in my laboratory before we go ahead with the plan, we could be able to find a means of guaranteeing success."
There was a pause, as the Mentor considered this. "Very well," she said at last. "But this can't wait forever: I'll expect your proposals within two days – otherwise, the plan will go ahead as originally directed. Is that understood?"
Kiln and Glinda nodded in unison.
"Good. Now, be on your way: I'd like to get some beauty sleep before the next forty-eight hours of incident reports."
Glinda immediately began ushering Elphaba away, quietly assuring her that everything was going to be okay… but Elphaba didn't hear much of it: the sense of ominousness that had been creeping up on her was now weighing her down, slowly crushing her under its hellish weight. And worse still, she now knew that it wasn't just the circumstances that were causing this sense of impending doom.
It was a vision – clearer and stronger than any prophetic attack she'd experienced before: in much the same way that her vision of the celebration throughout Oz had brought a sense of joy and hope, in much the same way that the prescient glimpse of the Gale house tumbling towards Munchkinland had brought foreboding and dread, so too did this vision bring with it a sense of haunting inevitability.
And with it, a glimpse of a single palace apartment, identical to her own:
The room is thick with shadows, lit only by a tiny candle on the kitchen table; a chess set has been arranged there, and a game is in progress: the black king stands alone, surrounded on all sides by an army of white pieces with the queen in the lead. The players are nowhere in sight.
But somewhere beyond the flickering light of the candle, someone is huddled in a corner.
And someone is singing:
"Unlimited…"
The voice is halting, uncertain; the lyrics are familiar, and one might almost think the song was meant to sound uplifting, but thanks to that lonely, hesitant voice in the dark, it sounds horribly, horribly wrong.
"Elphaba?"
Dorothy is creeping into the room, now; she doesn't switch on any of the lamps or carry a candle of her own, but there's no mistaking the glow her eyes cast. In darkness, the traits left behind by the Hellion are stronger still.
The song echoes again: "Together, we're… unlimited…"
"Elphaba, is that you?"
"Together we'll be the greatest team there's ever been…"
But Dorothy cannot hear the singing: she can only see the silhouette lurking in the darkness. Shuddering, she fumbles for the nearest light switch, but it seems as though the lamp can barely manage to summon up enough illumination to see the shadows by. However, it's clear that the figure sitting in the corner is indeed Elphaba.
"Why are you cooped up in here? Everyone's been asking after you for the last few hours; Glinda says you were supposed to report to Dr Kiln's office. I mean, I thought you'd stick around for the good news!"
"Dreams the way we planned 'em… if we work in tandem…"
"They say they can get Lintel's portal working again, Elphaba: we can go home now – to Oz, to Kansas, wherever we want! It's over, Elphaba, it's-"
Elphaba's voice rises in volume, and now Dorothy can hear the singing: "There's no fight we cannot win… just you and I, defying gravity… with you and I, defying gravity… they'll never bring us down…"
The song ends abruptly as Elphaba stands – and as she does so, both the candle and the lamp suddenly erupt with light, bringing the details of the room into sharp relief: where there were once shadows, now there are broken pieces of furniture, torn scraps of paper, spilled puddles of ink and overturned spellbooks. The walls have been smeared with anarchic-looking messages, daubed in a mixture of ink and what looks alarmingly like blood:
"THE NIGHT MUST HOLD," they read; "SMOTHER THE LIGHT," "CAN'T LET HER SPREAD TO OZ," "I WANT TO BE BEAUTIFUL AGAIN," and most alarmingly of all, "NOT MY FLESH NOT MY FLESH NOT MY FLESH NOT MY FLESH NOT MY FLESH NOT MY FLESH."
But the worst sight of all is Elphaba: her face and arms are covered in bloody scratches – and judging by the crescents of dried blood and skin under her fingernails, these aren't battle wounds.
"She's in here," she whispers, tapping the side of her head. "We thought we'd gotten rid of her, but… she hung on. And I've been trying to…" Her face twitches violently, as if she can't bring herself to finish her sentence. "I've been trying to…" She gestures in the direction of the table, at something past the chessboard. "But she won't let me, and-"
Very slowly, Elphaba collapses to her knees, exhausted beyond measure. "I didn't want it to be you. You've been through so much already, but… I can't do this myself. I need your help, Dorothy. Please…"
Dorothy glances over her shoulder, and finally sees what Elphaba was pointing at:
There's a knife among the discarded pawns.
"Kill me," Elphaba whispers. "Please… kill me… before it's too late."
And then the vision ended, but the sense of inevitability followed Elphaba down the hall and all the way into Kiln's lab, where it refused to leave.
"Colonel Gloss, I assume."
"…How exactly are you accessing this network?"
"I have my little ways."
"Then allow me to make a recommendation to you, Your Radiance: if you're calling me for a reason, you'd best outline it – or the next time I'll see you, I will personally use your pretty little eyes for earrings."
"Bold as ever, I see. Has anyone ever told you that you have an impressive talent for making the most diabolical threats without losing the smile on your face?"
"Get to the point, Empress, or I'll scoop your eye sockets clean on every single battle from now until the day I die."
"Very well: I have a proposition for you, Colonel, and for any members of the Strangling Coils who no longer wish to follow the leadership of Rostov Branderstove."
"…you have my attention. Is this transmission secure?"
"Completely. Even the Mistress of Mirrors can't overhear this."
"What is it that you want of me?"
"I rather think this is about what you want, Colonel Gloss. You see, I know of your… origins: I know of your past experiences with Purification, and I know that you still long to experience the full benefits of the procedure. The mage-surgeon you met all those years ago was one of my emissaries, a man I sent abroad in order to preach the righteousness of perfection, and I know that you accepted his teachings. You were a member of the merchant's guild in Clathostan, according to his notes, selected for your gifts in commerce and negotiation. I also know that my late emissary used a more unorthodox version of the common procedure to account for the lack of flesh-porcelain, but despite the unconventional treatments, it would have worked – had you not been interrupted. You would have been fully Purified that day if it hadn't been for the selfishness of the Deviants… but I must admit, for an unfinished masterpiece, you've shown great promise. I'm a little disappointed that you ran from Dr Vivectess' lab, however."
"He was dead, Empress, and the building was being mortared. What did you expect me to do, run to your empire and throw myself at your mercy? Unbridled Radiance isn't known for tolerating mistakes."
"Exceptions can be made, Gloss. By now, I'm well aware that you enjoy some of the benefits of Purification: enhanced strength, resilience, agility, facial restructuring, a resistance to the aging process, the ability to act without fear, and above all else, the focus of mind needed to act in the name of a goal without heeding lesser concerns."
"It's always nice to have my better qualities recognized…"
"According to Dr Vivectess, you had that ruthlessness from birth; Purification merely gave it a means of blossoming. You're a driven individual even by the standards of the Purified, Gloss. But for all your gifts and enhancements, you're still inferior to one of my elite: you don't have the full range of strength, nor the clarity of mind, nor the immortality. It may take decades, but you will die in the fullness of time just as any other mortal… but if you choose to accept my offer, I can grant you all the gifts that the Deviant army stole from you back in Clathostan. You would number among the immortal Purified, and all records of your time as incomplete masterpiece would be expunged. Just think of it: no more bowing and scraping to that bloated Distortion, no more scrabbling uphill for every paycheck, no more mud, blood and rage billowing in your heart – only perfection, beauty and eternal bliss. You'll even have your ear back. And all you have to do is arrange for transportation."
"Would I be wrong in guessing that this transportation will involve betraying the Leviathan in some way?"
"If he stands in the way of this process, you will need to be ready to kill him. Does that trouble you?"
"Not at all: he was a good employer before this debacle, but ever since he accepted this alliance with the Mentor, his coffers have been running dry from the expense of paying us and keeping the company afloat. Unless he starts demanding money from the Mentor, he'll soon be penniless… but that's the thing about vengeance: it never pays off. I'm certain that there'll be plenty of mercenaries willing to help me on this mission, if you're prepared to offer them payment."
"More than prepared."
"Good. What do you want us to move?"
"During our attempted invasion of the Deviant Nations, our air fleet dropped several payloads across the country, scattering them wherever they flew. We called them "gift baskets." A few have ended up in Greenspectre, but as luck would have it, one complete gift basket was found and brought inside the palace itself."
"Ah. I think I know what you're referring to: we were tasked with hauling that inside the palace on the night of festivities."
"I'm going to need you to assemble it properly: the gift baskets are programmed to activate and assemble at my signal, but the storeroom where they've been hidden has been shielded against such intrusions. Once it's been assembled, with a little bit of magical assistance from your end, it will activate immediately."
"And what will happen when it activates, pray tell?"
"Something wonderful…"
High above Greenspectre, a door creaked open and shut, admitting eight bedraggled figures into a decidedly eccentric palace apartment – and from there, into an extremely cluttered lab.
There was a pause, as Elphaba sighed deeply.
"Honestly, Kiln, how do you find anything in this mess?"
"A rather unique sorting system I like to call 'I don't have enough time to perform research of my own given the current workload so everything I want to research ends up getting left here and piling up.' Does that explain the situation?"
"Perfectly. You want to help me tidy up a little bit?"
"If you'd care to loan me your broom, sure."
"Oh, ho, ho, ho. Come on, we've got work to do…"
Since she'd last seen it, Dr Kiln's private laboratory had gotten even more cluttered, if that were possible: he'd been receiving packages from all over the Deviant Nations, it seemed, all of them bound with stasis spells to keep the contents fresh, and all of them had been waiting for him to return and study them. Unfortunately, much like the Champion's corpse in the nearby operating theatre, much like the comatose body of the Lion that still languished in one of the nearby beds, it seemed they'd have to wait a little longer.
As it turned out, Kiln had collected a sizable library of information on numerous topics over the years, including the developing science of dimensional physics: much of it had been stacked on the bookshelves of his apartment, but the real treasures of the collection had been stashed in a drawer in his lab – magically compressed in order to allow as much space as humanly possible for new volumes. The plan – if it could be called as such – was to study the available tomes and spellbooks for any potential details that that could save Elphaba's life, while Kiln performed the necessary experiments. Given the size of the collection, it was going to take a while, so Glinda had invited Fiyero, Boq, Chistery, Vara and Dorothy along for the ride. If nothing else, they could help get through the reading.
Unfortunately, getting to the read required them to do some tidying up first. Grumbling, Elphaba began gathering up some of the bulkier packages and stacking them off to the side – where they'd hopefully avoid being trodden on by guests – while Glinda and Kiln began sweeping away the debris of the last neglected experiment. It wasn't too long before she found something else to discuss among the recently opened parcels, however:
"What is this?" she demanded, holding up a maggot-like lump of flesh suspended in a glass jar.
"That's a tissue sample recovered from Mourner's Lake."
"Okay, fair enough. I wondered why it was growing fingernails… but why is it clearly still alive?"
"Because it belonged to the Empress," said Kiln, smirking ever-so-slightly.
Elphaba nearly dropped it. "What?"
"One of the inevitable consequences of getting into a firefight with Alphaba. She can recover from almost any wound, including dismemberment and decapitation, but she naturally still leaves chunks of shredded flesh hanging around the battlefield."
"And these grow into entities in their own right?!"
"Not entirely. They still possess a substantial ability to regenerate, but never enough to completely reconstitute themselves in the same way that the Empress can; they can't seem to get the hang of a complete brain. Unless the Empress goes out of the way to assimilate these severed appendages back into her body, they'll just lie there, struggling to rebuild themselves until they finally exhaust their powers and necrosis sets in. It'll take months, years in some rare cases, but they will die. In the meantime, tissue samples like these are near-priceless test subjects."
"And that's how you've been working out how to kill the Empress? By poking and prodding bits and pieces of cast-off flesh?"
"In a word, yes."
Trying not to look too closely at the way the lump of human meat writhed under the fluorescent lights, Elphaba moved onto another package.
"Hey, I've seen these before!" She held up the small metal oblong and studied it under the light for a moment. "Unbridled Radiance had these loaded into the cargo holds of their invasion fleet: General Stellham was having them dropped all over the Deviant Nations, if I remember correctly."
"So I heard, but we've yet to account for more than a handful of the complete sets. This one here is the only one left of its set; the rest were partly destroyed when you blew up Stellham's flagship. The Mentor tells me we've got another complete set under lock and key downstairs, though, so at least there's no shortage of specimens."
"But what do they actually do?"
"Well, I haven't had time to study them in detail, but this one looks to be both magical and mechanical in nature: circuitry and wiring merged with alchemical compounds and magical designs. I'd assume the complete model was meant to serve as some kind of weapon – a bomb, perhaps, or a radiological dispersal device – but the invaders obviously weren't able to activate them before you destroyed their fleet."
"That's reassuring, I guess. Now, what the hell is…"
Elphaba blinked.
"Kiln, why do you have the Ruby Slippers in here?" she asked, her voice a glacial whisper.
Dr Kiln sighed wearily. "Please don't be angry now, Elphaba, not when we're trying to find a way to save your life."
"I'm not angry in the slightest, doctor. I'd just like an explanation as to why my dead sister's shoes are currently gathering dust in your laboratory."
"Because you forgot all about them, remember? You left them back in the palace the moment you ran off to save Dorothy, without even bothering to secure them. So, the Mentor had them sent up here for safekeeping. Frankly, they're much safer up here until we can find a way to send you home… and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't intrigued by their power."
"Safer? What do you mean, 'safer?' They're ruby slippers: they're elaborate, they're expensive and they're enchanted. That's it. What could possibly be dangerous – or intriguing – about them?"
"Because, along with the spells you enchanted the slippers with, you also accidentally imbued them with a substantial degree of magical energy. As far as I know, these shoes used to be made of silver up until you got hold of them, and even the spells of the Grimmerie can't explain all the anomalous readings I've been getting off these damn things. As far as I can tell, your tinkering with them has converted the Slippers into a magical generator of sorts."
"Then what can they be used for, apart from helping Nessa to walk?"
"Oh, anything, really. That energy you've imbued can be put to almost any conceivable use, so long as it's given enough time to build to sufficient levels. They could be used for spellcasting, protection in battle, even something as mundane as adjusting clothes."
"Is that why they fit so well?" Dorothy asked. "I thought it was a little weird that Nessa's shoes would fit my feet when she'd been a lot older than me."
"Very probably, yes."
Eventually, Fiyero was able to draw Elphaba away from the discussion and into the collection of books awaiting them, followed closely by Glinda, Dorothy, Vara, Boq, and Fiyero himself. Pausing only to find some suitably cosy armchairs in the apartment outside, they sat down and started reading. It quickly became clear that many of them needed assistance from Kiln to decipher some of the more esoteric jargon – especially Dorothy – and though Elphaba was able to substitute thanks to years of magical experience, it was still uphill work.
For good measure, once Kiln's experiments were underway, they needed a little "cooking time" before the results could be fully ascertained, meaning that it wasn't long before he joined them in the reading group. As he read, he drew a pair of knitting needles and a ball of wool from the coffee table and began absently working away at what appeared to be a rainbow-coloured scarf the length of a bridal train, his snakelike fingers working the needs with unearthly dexterity. From what Elphaba could tell, the more anxious Kiln become, the less attention he paid to reading and the more energy he devoted to knitting: judging by the rate of stitches per minute, he was barely keeping his composure intact.
But it wasn't as if Kiln was alone in this respect. Nobody here looked brimful of confidence: Fiyero was nervously teasing a stray piece of straw from a hole in his arm as he read; Vara was chewing furiously on her bottom lip as she took notes on her current findings; poor Chistery could barely read, much less sit still; Dorothy was biting her nails, and every now and again would glance anxiously up at Elphaba, looking guilty for not having found anything yet; and Boq looked completely lost. By far the saddest sight of all was Glinda: she'd grown several sets of additional eyes and two extra arms so she could read more books than the others, but with no findings on the horizon, she'd started involuntarily changing colours – a sure sign that she was becoming intolerably nervous.
I'm going to die, Elphaba thought. Everyone's thinking it, but nobody's saying it: I'm going to die and there's nothing anyone can do about it – no loopholes, no solutions, no escapes. Just me dying with the Empress.
And Elphaba felt a sudden pang of regret at this. It took her a while to realize why: it was because she was going to break Fiyero's heart. In a few short days, Fiyero was going to be in the same position Elphaba had been in right after the disaster in Munchkinland… except he wouldn't have the luck of finding out that she'd miraculously survived. After everything he'd done just to be reunited with her, after all the miles he'd travelled and the hardships he'd undergone, he was going to lose her forever.
Even after all this time, Brr is still drifting.
He has been floating between dreams and memories for what feels like an eternity: he has experienced his terror-stricken childhood and embarrassingly mediocre adulthood a thousand times over, and he has dreamed of everything from giant whirlpools of clotted cream to knife-wielding carrots chasing him through a stadium of people who can only point and laugh at him.
But as strange as it all seems, even to his unconscious mind, here's aware of seeing stranger things. He's aware of moments in which he is himself – and yet someone else: he would call them dreams, but as weird as they are, they're too coherent to be ordinary dreams; they feel more like memories, though he knows that he never personally experienced these fantastical events.
In these strange not-quite-dreams, the Wicked Witch is somehow no longer green and is part of the Wizard's government… and in every single one, Brr is more than just a cowardly lion.
In fact, as these strange mental vignettes go on, he takes on many roles: first, he is a homeless vagabond, much as he was in the days before Dorothy and the others found him; then, he is a volunteer in a revolutionary movement, helping a secret think tank with their experiments; he is an actor in the greatest act of theatre ever seen by Oz, a performance that deposes the Wizard and puts the Witch on the throne; he is a curious participant in experimental trials, testing the shapeshifting potion that allowed the performance in the first place… and then he is something else.
A hedonist.
A thief.
A leader.
Bit by bit, the other Brr grows bolder: first, he begins stealing doses of the potion for elicit transformations; gliding through the night as a bird or galloping through forests as a horse, he exalts in his ability to change. Then a mage-surgeon notices his midnight flights, and asks if she can join in. Before long, a clandestine circle of like-minded hedonists forms, stealing doses of the potion and shapeshifting for amusement; as the most experienced of them, Brr is their leader. In pursuit of greater thrills, they study the true extent of what their potion is capable of, of what their bodies can do when augmented. They even refine the potion to be more potent and longer-lasting, at the cost of requiring greater self-discipline: it usually only takes a month to get the hang of the basics, but greater extents of mass-shifting and shape-mastery require more time – but once again, Brr leads the pack in researching the true extent of power and control.
Then, when the Witch – now known as the Empress – cracks down on their amusements, they go underground, and other Brr becomes a rebel: he is not like the other Glinda, leading the protesters and revolutionaries in war against the Empress, nor is he like Morrible and her cadre of immortality-enthusiasts hunting for imperial blood. He is not even a convert to the Deviant Nations when they finally appear.
But he has found something that he cannot give up: he has found something that reveals who he truly is; he has found something that gives him true freedom – from fear, from uncertainty, from his own clumsy, embarrassing body, from the expectations of his fellow Lions and from the society that treated him as either a joke or a pawn.
When he is shapeshifting – when he is in the fluid, protean state of existence between forms – he is no longer the one they call the Cowardly Lion.
He is himself.
And having known the bliss of freedom, he will not let the Empress take that joy away from him or from his new friends.
For years, they keep themselves hidden, defying the new government in secrecy, gathering in new members and marvelling at the changes the potion enacts on their default bodies.
The other Brr is changing: his body grows less and less distinct with time, discarding individual traits until he seems almost generic; his pawprints vanish, his eyes lose all sense of identity, and before long, even a mage-surgeon would struggle to identify him by his blood.
His sex is next to go, gender becoming indistinct and unrecognizable – and eventually he can no longer be described as male or female, but as something else, something new and wonderful. He allows the others to call him by his former gender, because they do not yet understand – but in time, they will: he is not he anymore, but they.
The other Brr knows that Unbridled Radiance will never forgive this: laws regarding personal identity are rigid under the Empress' rule, refusing any change that deviates from her vision of perfection and purity. Wilful gender ambiguity, deviance against sexual norms and "insults" towards the "natural template" of the body are crimes punishable by death or worse… but Brr doesn't care. They are no longer afraid. They carry on, every transformation a defiant wad of spittle in the face of Unbridled Radiance, a glorious middle finger raised at the suffocating laws that govern the empire.
Brr's flesh becomes unusually elastic even when in their default form; their bones seem to wither inside their body, becoming rubbery and fluid, until they can almost bounce down the street. Their fur becomes dull and flakes away in clumps. Their eyes burn with light or vanish for hours on end. Their muzzle shrinks back into his face or extends outwards at odd intervals. Bit by bit, the other Brr retreats into his inner sanctum to hide from the envious eyes of Unbridled Radiance, a caterpillar waiting to emerge from the chrysalis.
It takes years of doses and dedication, but eventually, the great metamorphosis is complete. This time, when they transform, their body transitions into protean matter… and never stops. The physical form gives way to limbs, teeth, wings, tentacles, pincers and a thousand other expressions of the flesh. The other Brr can be anyone or anything: walking down the street, they become a passer-by seen only for a split-second, a streetlamp, a horse cantering down the road, even one of the Purified. Before long, they transform out of habit more than anything else, warping from shape to shape as casually as blinking – and just as frequently.
The other Brr is no longer Brr.
They are the First of the Shapeless.
For a time, they are happy: they are an inspiration and a teacher to others of their kind, showing them the path to mastery and ushering them closer to the joy of Shapelessness. Omber Landless is a marvellous pupil, adapting to her metamorphosis with much excitement: like many before her, her flesh had become a prison from which only shapeshifting offered an escape, and her new androgynous nature brings her happiness beyond all imagination.
But all good things must pass.
They are discovered. Their friends, the Amorphous League, must flee. They take as many of the shapeshifters over the border as they can, then scatter far and wide, promising each other that they will one day meet again.
And then, the First of the Shapeless is a hermit. For decades, they wander from country to country to stay ahead of Unbridled Radiance's expansion, taking numerous roles and wearing many different masks: they are a janitor, a soldier, a presidential body double, a repairman, a gladiator, a woodsman, a fashion model, a demolitions expert, a hairdresser, an assassin; more than once, they even pose as pets.
But then the call is heard…
And Brr can only marvel at the wonders that unfolded before his mind's eye because none of it really happened – and if it did, it didn't happen to him.
It happened to another Brr.
How long has the Cowardly Lion been dreaming? How long has it been since he slipped into this long, cloying, inescapable slumber? Are his friends waiting for him out there? Is Dorothy by his bedside, as he sometimes imagines she is? Is the Witch waiting for him? Will she be able to explain what happened to him all those years ago? They never allow him to speak for himself at the rallies – they simply say that she made him a coward, that he was a victim of her ego and pride, but he doesn't know…
And with the final dream echoing through his sleeping brain, another realization slowly creeps up on him: somewhere ahead of him, light is beginning to trickle through the darkness.
Somewhere, dawn is breaking.
Hours later, Elphaba found herself as one of the few members of the reading group still actually reading.
Vara had been called away to help out at the Chapter Temple, Kiln was now back in his lab and trying another means of saving her life, Glinda was frantically sorting through the collection in the hope of finding something Kiln had overlooked, Chistery was swooping from perch to perch in nervous desperation, and Dorothy was sitting alone, absently hugging Toto (who was trying to buoy her spirits in the way most dogs did, namely by repeatedly licking her face). She'd suggested bringing in the Dolls to help, but Kiln had politely nixed the idea on the grounds that there was barely enough room in the apartment to go around – and he didn't know if the Dolls could even read.
Boq and Fiyero were still busy with research, mainly because neither of them could physically tire, but it wasn't as if that could make up for the fact that neither of them had found anything worthwhile. So far, every single potentially useful idea their reading circle had uncovered had been countered before it could even get past the conceptual stage, either due to time constraints or due to the Empress's own defences.
By now, Elphaba was only reading out of curiosity and concentrated boredom: she'd been so busy for the last few weeks that she'd barely had any time to sit down and enjoy a decent read, and a chance to read some of the rare books that Kiln had been collecting over the years was more than welcome. Besides, the subject matter helped her take her mind off the crawling anxieties.
Presently, however, she became aware that Dorothy had taken a seat on the floor by her side and was now looking expectantly up at her, Toto still in her arms.
"What's wrong?"
Dorothy bit her lip. "You don't think this is going to work, do you?" she said quietly.
"In a word, no. I don't think we're going to find anything here that'll save my life. I don't think anything can save my life at this point unless we can build a portal and get me through it record time… and it looks like that's pretty much out of the question."
"But surely there's something I can-"
Elphaba sighed. "Don't start putting it all on your shoulders, Dorothy: that's my job. You might have the Hellion's memories rattling around in your head, you might have the power to command the Dolls, and you might even be as powerful as the Hellion was one of these days – but that doesn't mean that you can do the impossible. Sometimes, there's no third option: sometimes, there's no such thing as winning."
"But you're still trying, though. That's got to mean something."
"It means that I'm a stubborn, ill-tempered blockhead who doesn't know how to give up."
"But it's worked before, hasn't it? You and the Mentor decided to stand up to the Hellion even when it would have been smarter just to hand me over. You went right into the Hellion's lair to rescue me, even though I'd pretty much told you to leave me there. You tried to bring down the Wizard even though he had everyone in Oz on his side and you were alone – and Glinda says you lasted for years. You do the impossible every day, Elphie! Why is it so hopeless now?"
This briefly threw Elphaba for a loop: for almost half a minute, she had nothing to say in response. Eventually, she remarked, "Maybe it's because I've gotten too used to the idea of dying in action: I've been dealing with that ever since I rebelled against the Wizard, and by now… well, it barely frightens me."
But it does bother me.
"I don't want to lose you, Elphie," said Dorothy. "And definitely not like this."
"Not like what?"
"Not… hopelessly. That's not you: you're never hopeless – you never give up. You throw yourself into danger no matter what, you shout and scream and blow things up and save the day even when all the odds are against you. That's you, Elphaba. You're a hero, you don't give up, and everyone knows it."
In spite of herself, Elphaba actually managed a smile. "It doesn't always work out that way… but it's not as if I'm going to fail, is it? We're just going to win in a way we didn't plan on. And that's usually the way things go for me, in the end." But seeing the downcast look on Dorothy's face, she added, "But we'll keep looking for solutions for a while yet. I don't see any harm in hoping for the best as long as we're prepared for the worst."
Sweet Lurline, how is it possible that I've ended up worrying about this girl's feelings so much? If you'd told me I'd end up coddling her like this back when I'd first met her, I'd have laughed myself sick.
There was a cough from the doorway: Kiln was standing there, an odd little smile on his face. "The Lion's awake," he announced.
"Don't try to talk for a minute, Brr; you're dehydrated. Just drink up and you'll be fine."
Brr groaned and obligingly sipped at the glass that had been handed to him. He had no idea where he'd ended up now, and he didn't recognize the bald, pallid figure fussing over him: his last clear memory was bedding down for the night, an agonizing pain in his back, and then nothing at all. As far as he could tell, he was lying on what appeared to be an improvised hospital bed in the dilapidated remains of someone's apartment, and his tail felt like he'd been sitting on it.
"Why does my tail feel so weird?" he croaked.
The doctor gave him a slightly manic look, as if pleading for understanding. "Because we had to reattach it," he said at last.
"You did what?"
"The Hellion carved it off. Thankfully, you were rescued long after and I was able to reattach your tail – and patch up most of the damage she lumbered you with. Unfortunately, the coma was a little trickier to deal with: you've been unconscious for over a month."
"A month? But where am I? Where's the Scarecrow and the Tin Man? And did they find out what happened to –"
There was a loud bark from the doorway.
And the next thing Brr knew, he had Dorothy's arms wrapped tightly around his mane and Toto barking excitedly in his ear. As startled as he was, the lion could only hug them back: after all, to him it felt like he and the others had only started chasing after Dorothy and the Hellion a few short days ago, but to her it had no doubt been weeks on end.
But how had she gotten this far? Even from the brief glimpse of her he'd gotten, Brr could tell that Dorothy had changed a lot since he'd last seen her: there was something different about her stance, something more eccentric but somehow more confident, though the Lion couldn't quite say exactly what it was. And was his imagination, or did her eyes seem to glow ever-so-slightly in the shadows of the room?
The Tin Man and the Scarecrow weren't too far behind her, one way or the other. And there was someone else standing in the doorway, just out of view…
A long and wonderfully drawn-out reunion followed, in which everyone talked about how they'd gotten this far. By the sounds of things, the Scarecrow had a meandering journey through the caverns and mountains of this unknown land, followed by a brief time in jail in a town called Loamlark, while the Tin Man had blundered across "No-Man's Land," wherever the hell that was, until a giant snake had given him a lift to the nearest town; however, as astonishing as these stories were, Brr couldn't shake the feeling that both of them had been heavily edited for his sake… and for some reason, Dorothy was unusually quiet on the subject.
In the end, Brr's curiosity got the better of him: "How did you get here, Dorothy?" he asked.
Dorothy offered a smile that was probably meant to look reassuring, but only ended up appearing painfully awkward. "Um, there's someone I want you to meet – don't panic, okay? I just want you to remember this: everything's okay and we're all friends. Just remember that."
And with that, the Wicked Witch of the West stepped into the room.
For a moment, Brr could only stare in confusion. Then his memory suddenly churned to life: he recalled everything he'd seen and heard in his dreams – the visions of the life the other Brr had lived – and he recalled moments from his childhood that he hadn't thought of in years. It was strange to look back on how he'd acted in the past, but looking back on his life thus far, so much of his fear of the Witch had been due to what little he could recall from his mercifully brief visit to Shiz and the script he'd been given to follow when the Wizard armed them against her. Even the few face-to-face encounters with her had been less frightening than the stories the people told about her, and certainly less traumatizing than his blurry recollections of what had been done to him in the cage. True, he'd played along with the Wizard and his press secretary just as the Tin Man had, if only because he couldn't bring himself to say 'no' with Dorothy's life on the line (and even then he'd been almost too crippled with stage fright to do much), but so much of his fear had been based on what other people told him to be afraid of. It was just like his teenage years, really, except where his adolescence had been filled with angry Lions screaming at him for being afraid of everything, his days among the Witch-Hunters had been filled with angry people with megaphones screaming at him for not being scared enough.
And now that the Witch stood before him, calm, composed offering her own version of Dorothy's reassuring smile, it was hard to genuinely be afraid of her. He knew it would be a mistake to think her harmless, but she just looked so genuinely concerned that the old anxiety simply refused to stir… and besides, now that he'd seen the other Brr's life play out in his dreams, he knew that the other Witch – the beautiful one that had called herself the Empress – was much more frightening and much monstrous than the earnest-faced woman who now stood before him.
But she wasn't just the Witch, though: Brr had heard her name once, many years ago… and now he finally remembered it.
"Remember what I told you about staying calm?" said Dorothy. "Just stay calm a little longer. She's a friend, just remember that. Her name's-"
"Elphaba," Brr finished.
There was a stunned pause.
"You've finally remembered, then?" Elphaba asked.
"I… I think so. I've remembered being at Shiz and what they did to me for a few years now, but I didn't remember what you were doing there. I guess I just allowed people to tell me what happened, but… I think I've finally started putting things together: I think I finally realized you're nowhere near as bad as the Wizard said you were."
"You're taking this astonishingly well, by the way."
"Well, this might sound a bit crazy, but I think I figured out the answers while I was still in the coma: I've been having the weirdest dreams, you see."
"Would any of these dreams happen to involve taking a magical potion and becoming the leader of a group of hobbyist shapeshifters?"
"…how did you know that?"
Elphaba smiled and pulled up a chair. "I think I should probably explain a few things," she said briskly. "You'd best get comfortable: this is going to be a very long and boring story…"
And so the explanations began in earnest: over the course of the next hour or so, Elphaba provided all the necessary details – on Brr's past, on the truth of what she'd been doing back in Oz, on the world that they'd landed in, and everything they'd been doing in order to survive. For good measure, Dorothy, the Scarecrow and the Tin Man all chimed in with their own additions to the story, including the parts that they'd played in Elphaba's own history; they even brought in Glinda to help.
By the end of it, Brr was even more exhausted than ever before, and well aware that he was totally adrift in a strange new world – not to mention a new kind of conflict that he had almost no stake in apart from his friends – but in spite of himself, he was almost completely satisfied with the truth as it was.
"So, I was a shapeshifter in another life? I'm… some kind of guerrilla leader here?"
"I can get you an interview with the First of the Shapeless, if you like; he'll be able to give you the skinny on everything that's happened in your other self's life if there's any gaps in the story."
"But this potion… sorry if I'm asking stupid questions again, but what I can remember is still a bit jumbled."
"It's okay, Brr; you ask whatever questions you need to ask."
"If these shapeshifting powers so useful, then why take the potion in such a small dose? I vaguely remember there was a bit of a craze among the League for a dosage of the potion that could guarantee Shapelessness instantly. So why aren't all the junior members trying that instead of wasting time with monthly doses?"
"Because it doesn't work that way: there's supposed to be hideous side-effects to overdosing, all of which… are… effectively…"
Elphaba very slowly trailed off, eyes widening in astonishment. Then, without warning, she dived forward and hugged him.
"Woah! What did I say? What happened?"
"I… I think I might have just found the solution we were looking for."
She giggled – actually giggled in delight, an incongruously-overjoyed smile etching itself across her sombre features. And behind the grin, her eyes were lit up with a wild, inexhaustible energy that Brr hadn't seen since the day Elphaba had first sprung him from the classroom back at Shiz… except on that day, her energy had been rage and wild, terrifying fury. Here and now, her eyes were wide with excitement, joy and maybe even the tiniest spark of hope.
Brr almost asked her what idea she'd just come up with, but at the last minute silenced himself, not wanting to spoil the moment. Right now, Elphaba was almost electric with energy, her pupils dancing from left to right as she visibly puzzled away at her options. Eventually, she let out a jubilant shriek of "Kiln!"
Dr Kiln darted out from around the corner, still holding the mangled remains of his latest experiment. "What? What's happening?"
"Is that tissue sample from the Empress still alive in there?"
"I can't imagine any reason why it wouldn't be. Why do you ask?"
"We're going to need it ready for an experiment; I'll explain in just a minute." She cleared her throat and turned to the others: "Listen up, everyone; I'm going to need some help from all of you. Uh… Glinda, have you got your monthly dose of the potion yet?"
"Uh, just a small vial – I'm not meant to take it for another couple of days."
"Still enough for an overdose in a first-timer, though. I'm afraid I'm going to need the vial for this experiment, Glinda, if it's-"
But Glinda had already handed over the vial without a word: she'd noticed the elated smile on Elphaba's face and was now gleefully mimicking it as her good mood turned contagious.
"In the meantime, could you find Leoverus and tell him to meet us up here ASAP? Have him bring along as much of the Amorphous League's potion as possible. Chistery, get a message to the Mentor; tell her that we've got possible solution at hand. Boq, head for the armourers and see what they've got in terms of launchers – I don't care if it's a blowpipe or a mortar, as long as it can fire something poisonous, it's viable; see if you can outfit yourself with one while you're down there, and get in as much practice as humanly possible. Dorothy, see if the Dolls can handle ranged weapons or if they can be trained to use them. Fiyero, I need you to get a message to Branderstove and the Strangling Coils, and be prepared to be as charming as humanly possible when you tell them that we might have a different idea in mind for how to deal with the Empress – and when I say 'charming,' I mean that you'll have to absolutely dazzle him with charisma."
Fiyero chuckled. "I knew you didn't just keep me around for my looks."
"It's all for your sparkling wit, darling," Elphaba quipped back.
"And you didn't even mention my prowess as a lover."
"Oh, shush!" Playfully kissing him, she all but shoved him out the door, hastily whispering her instructions to him as he departed.
"Okay, everyone," she called to the rest of the group. "We're going to need this done sooner rather than later, so let's move it! Kiln, ready or not, it's time for experimentation!"
A/N: Any guesses as to what Elphaba might be planning? Let me know!