The Land of What-Might-Have-Been

by Straightjacketed

After spending so many years wishing that things had been different, what happens when, halfway through their final meeting, Elphaba and Glinda find themselves unexpectedly plunged into the worst of all possible worlds? AU.

69. The Land Of What-Might-Have-Been

A/N: Back again at long last, ladies and gents. This is going to be a bit of a long chapter and frankly a bit of a mindscrew - just as much to read as it was to write - but I had great fun putting this madness together, and I hope you enjoy it.

Anyway, without further ado, the latest chapter: read, review, and above all, enjoy.

Disclaimer: Wicked isn't mine, and neither are the things I reference in this chapter - for the sake of avoiding a spoiler, I can't mention all of them. Also, the Divine Comedy doesn't belong to me either.

---

To Elphaba's intense relief, the Nome King didn't try anything sinister upon curling up in the back of her mind.

For a little while after the initial pain had faded, there was a vague sense of discomfort welling in her skull, as if Roquat was looking for the most comfortable place to sit, rather like a man plumping the cushions on a sofa before putting his feet up – but that was it. As soon as this was over, he started providing directions through the void, pointing her in the general direction of the first portal

"But how am I supposed to actually get there?" she asked. "I can't manoeuvre myself through the void without a broomstick."

You've been able to levitate under your own power before, the King reminded her. And you've taken more doses of witch-crystal since then, yes?

"If you've seen as much as you claim, you should know full well that I've never actually flown using that power, much less moved myself through space; I could just about keep myself airborne and lower myself safely to the ground."

Only because you've never had the occasion to try. If you'd be willing to permit a momentary sharing of power, perhaps I can demonstrate just how far you can push this ability...

A moment later, Elphaba felt her intrinsic powers flare to life, the familiar green aura rippling into view around her seemingly of its own accord. For a moment, she felt her thaumaturgical muscles straining with a new and daunting task, her magic struggling to accomplish what had previously seemed impossible even as the Nome King's own willpower began giving commands in her stead.

Then, without warning, she found herself beginning to rise into the air. It was difficult to notice at first, given that directions like up or down had no presence in the void, but as Roquat began directing more of her power towards the task, the subtle but unmistakable sense of upward pressure became impossible to ignore: she was going up, floating out of her aimless drift and into the semi-visible cobwebbing of portals suspended not far above the Nome King's former resting place.

It was impossible to put into words how she knew they were there, given that they were almost imperceptible at a distance while dormant, but she could sense their presence in much the same way that some people could instinctively sense danger in apparently harmless situations. Presumably this was due to Roquat's influence, but it was still shocking to realize just how close she was to taking the first step back to the Deviant Nations.

Perhaps ten feet from the portal, the Nome King's guiding hand loosened ever-so-slightly, leaving her paused in mid-air.

Do you think you can sustain our ascent on your own now that I have shown you the way?

"I… think so…"

Then I will release my hold. Remember, there's no gravity here, so you're in no danger of falling: just remember to maintain your upward progression and you'll be fine.

Seconds later, Roquat retreated back into the depths of her mind, and Elphaba briefly bobbed up and down in mid-air as she struggled to continue onwards. Eventually, she managed to get a grip on the process, for despite the challenge of moving herself through space, it wasn't that much different from the same basic acts of telekinesis she'd exhibited when she was a kid, except this time she was trying to move herself into the air. Bit by bit, she painstaking forced herself across the infinite nothingness, first by inches and then by feet, moving faster and faster with every passing moment.

But even with this new aspect of her powers more or less under control, it wasn't easy to maintain. Back when she'd first discovered her magic, she'd experienced an overwhelming sense of strain and exertion while using her rudimentary powers, and this act of self-levitation was no different: it felt like she was trying to lift an anvil with a length of fishing wire using the very tips of her fingers, only the anvil was herself. Every yard travelled seemed to add another tiny stabbing pain to the innumerable horde of them now attacking her body, as if someone were slowly boring holes in her muscles with a dentist's drill.

It took less than fifteen seconds for her to cross the divide between her and the portal, but it felt like an hour, every moment stretching out longer and longer the more she grappled with the effort of forcing her own mind and body through space. But as she broached the last two or three feet, the dormant portal seemed to ripple in space – and suddenly the void was lit up by a blinding flash of light.

For a split second, she heard Roquat softly reciting a complex series of numbers and calculations.

Then-

---

The transition from one world to another was nothing short of astonishing.

One moment she was hovering in the void, wondering how much longer she could keep levitating, the next she was crashing to the ground in another dimension. Dazed from her arrival, she looked up in bewilderment and immediately regretted it: having spent the last few minutes floating about in a realm of absolute darkness, the return to daylight nearly blinded her.

For the next few seconds, Elphaba could only kneel on the floor with her eyes clenched shut against the merciless sunlight, aware only of the marble flagstones she'd fallen against. Eventually, she recovered enough to open her eyes again – and promptly realized that something was quite clearly amiss.

She was sitting on the uppermost balcony of a colossal tower stretching thousands upon thousands of feet into the dazzling blue sky. From what little she could tell at this juncture, the tower was built entirely from polished white marble, or something so similar that it was impossible to tell the difference; whatever the case, it was all made of one smooth, unblemished white stone, from the flawless walls of the building itself to the flagstones on which she'd fallen against. As her eyes continued to adjust to the glare, she soon realized that this structure was not alone in the sky: the horizon was clustered with dozens upon dozens of other white towers, forming a gleaming skyline of polished marble as far as the eye could see, a city unlike any Elphaba had seen before. Thousands of feet below, the streets of this strange metropolis rippled with light, the glare from the alabaster roads and the barely recognizable vehicles that travelled along them nearly blinded her all over again.

And yet, there was something immediately disturbing about this place. It took Elphaba a little while to recognize what it was, but once she turned her gaze to the horizon for a second time, it was impossible to miss: every single tower on the skyline was perfectly identical – same height, same shape, same composition, same eerily symmetrical design; not a single hint of differing architecture could be found anywhere in sight. The same went for the streets connecting them far below, with each yard of distance perfectly replicated across the length and breadth of the city. And unless she was deeply mistaken, the traffic on the roads looked almost identical from one street to the next.

Now that you've recovered, said the Nome King, it's time we were moving on. We need to head for street level – preferably without getting too much attention.

Elphaba turned around, making directly for the building's interior. But as pushed aside the glass doors and stepped indoors, she immediately realized that she'd made a horrible mistake. The inside of the building was every bit as white, spotless and symmetrical as its exterior, with every chair, table, counter and doorway portioned and balanced with the kind of mathematical precision that could only have been accomplished by a machine. It looked somewhat like a boardroom, except designed with none of the usual amenities most boardrooms in Oz and the Deviant Nations were equipped with. By itself, it would have been merely unnerving… but the room was occupied, and the figures seated around the table couldn't have existed outside of a nightmare.

There were about eight of them in total. Much like the buildings outside, they were of the same height, build, skin colour, clothing and facial structure; none of them could be recognized as male or female, having no visible secondary sex characteristics or even the vaguest differences in bone structure, and all of them were dressed in the same identical white jumpsuits drawn tight across their featureless bodies like second skins. With no recognizable identities or differing elements to their physiologies, they might as well have been mass-produced mannequins propped up in their chairs… if not for the sounds they were emitting. From what little Elphaba could tell, they appeared to speaking with one another, for they were producing sounds at least somewhat akin to language, though Elphaba was at a loss as to how they were doing so; quite apart from the notable facial quirk, their throats didn't appear to move as they spoke – or at all, in results of the apparent attempts at speech sounded like a bizarre combination of whalesong and choral vocalizations, a series of eerily harmonious trills, exaltations, whistles, drones, howls and lamentations.

Most disturbingly of all, they had no faces: from the crowns of their skulls to the tips of their chins, they were without features of any kind; no eyes, no hair, no nose, no mouth – just a perfectly-smooth expanse of stark-white flesh, as flawless as the marble walls and every bit as unyielding.

As Elphaba stepped into the room, all eight figures turned towards her in perfect unison, and though none of them had eyes or even the slightest hint of an expression, she instinctively realized that they could see her. At once, the haunting whirr of alien conversation sputtered out, plunging the room into deathly silence as the faceless beings regarded her.

Then they began to snarl.

Though none of them had mouths or even the slightest hint of vocal cords at work in their throats, a low growling filled the air, a growling that rose steadily to a bloodcurdling roar of rage. Once again in perfect unison, the eight figures leapt to their feet, flung their chairs aside and launched themselves at Elphaba with perfect-synchronized howls.

A swift blast of magic easily flung them across the room, but all eight recovered with impossible and went on the attack again. By now, Elphaba had seen enough: she had a feeling that asking for explanations or trying to negotiate would be pointless, given that she couldn't even comprehend what was being said, so she didn't even bother. She knew perfectly well that she wasn't welcome here. So, as soon as she swatted her attackers away for a second time, she immediately fled back outside, hurtled across the balcony and flung herself over the railing.

Thankfully, levitation was a lot easier when she wasn't forcing herself to move upwards. As soon as she'd braced herself in the air, she loosened her grip until she began to descend towards the ground, maintaining just enough magical power to drift safely down the side of the building without risking serious injury – a little quicker than her awestruck arrival in Greenspectre following her battle in the sky, but still a bit more relaxed than using a parachute.

Unfortunately, it seemed her rather leisurely plunge had been noticed, for dozens of other faceless figures were flocking to the windows and balconies of every floor she passed, staring at her with blank, featureless faces. On the upside, none of them could reach her from this distance without flinging themselves to their deaths, but unless she picked up the pace, she'd probably have a very unfriendly welcoming committee waiting for her when she finally reached the ground. And though the crowd once again had no means of conveying expressions, Elphaba could tell that all of them hated her with an intensity that transcended reason.

So much for not getting too much attention, said Roquat, airily.

"Where the hell are we?" Elphaba demanded, hastily accelerating down the side of the tower. "And who were those people?"

We're in a Conceptual Realm. This is one of the lowest universes in the chain of portals, but it's unfortunately the only way of getting back to your point of origin. As for who and what these people are, I like to call them Perfectionites; okay, I was going to call them Perfectionists, but that would have become a bit confusing in the long run.

"I'm going to need a little more information that that, Your Highness. What is a Conceptual Realm?"

Conceptual Realms don't grow and develop like ordinary worlds through random chance; in fact, they're born entirely from a concept that's formed throughout the multiverse and fed through its perpetuation. You see, these lower reaches of the multiverse are very sensitive to the thoughts of sapient beings, and when exposed to an especially powerful concept contained within the minds of individuals across infinity… well, just look around.

"What, so we're talking about an emotional concept? A desire?"

Or a belief, yes. Basically, when enough people believe in something or want something associated with a certain concept, especially sensitive regions of the multiverse warp and twist to accommodate those thoughts, and a new world is born as a result – usually one based on what the concept would be like if taken to the logical extreme.

"And what concept is this world based around?"

The desire for perfection. The longing for a perfect world: peaceful, orderly, unified, and with all differences abolished.

"And anyone who doesn't conform is judged "imperfect" and immediately sentenced to death. Plus, there's total unanimity of opinion because differing perspectives would only be a sign of imperfection, so every single of these Perfectionites are in complete agreement about killing any outsiders on the spot."

Exactly. This is the logical extreme of the ideal held by everyone who has ever wanted to craft a utopia: the Empress, the Mentor, you, me, everyone with the slightest bit of ambition for a better world built this place without even meaning to.

Elphaba blinked in astonishment, feeling personally attacked for the first time in a while. "What do you mean, me?"

Didn't you spend years on end fighting your way across Oz in the name a world where Animals could live freely? Haven't you spent the last few months fighting for the cause of the Deviant Nations, in the name of a world where all have the freedom to do with their bodies as they see fit? You wanted to make the world a better place… and that desire fed this realm.

"Okay, I see your point, but… holy hell, even if this is a world of logical extremes, I never imagined it could possibly go this far."

Few do. The portal to the next world in line is just on the street corner, Elphaba – and I'd be quick about reaching it if I were you: we seem to be attracting a crowd.

Elphaba looked down and realized with horror that her prediction was already coming true: hundreds of faceless Perfectionites were pouring out of the tower and were flocking into the street beneath her; across the road, hundreds more were emptying out of the adjacent building as well – and the tower across from that, and across from that. All over the city, the population was abandoning its current tasks in favour of zeroing on Elphaba, erupting out of the buildings and leaping from vehicles and swivelling around in mid-step all just to focus on the figure slowly descending towards them.

Thanks to the Nome King's insight, she could sense the dormant portal nearby, just a yard or so away from her landing point and just waiting to burst open at her approach… but with barely twenty feet left until she landed, she knew that there was no chance of reaching the portal from street level: even with magic on her side, the crowd would probably rip her to pieces long before she got anywhere near it.

Muttering a few choice obscenities, she flung herself through the air with a lurch of barely-controlled levitation – and barely managed to move three inches.

By now, the Perfectionites were almost in reach of her, their arms outstretched towards the sky, their smooth alabaster-pale fingers curled into claws ready to tear her apart. Again, they had no expressions, but Elphaba could sense the hate oozing off them like so much boiling steam… and as she drew closer, she could almost hear the building chorus being whispered without lips, a single word uttered over and over again until it sounded (to Elphaba's ears) almost like the word "kill."

It would have been embarrassing to come this far just to die at the hands of an angry mob, so Elphaba forced herself into motion, lurching clumsily across the street one foot at a time, pressing herself to levitate horizontally with all her might, trying to ignore the strain that made her feel as if the effort might catapult her brain out through her ears.

A cold hand brushed her leg, a dozen more digging several talonlike fingers into her undefended ankles.

Elphaba kicked them aside, swept a few dozen obstacles aside with a spell, tried to ignore Roquat reciting numbers, and then flung herself forward feet-first-

---

-and landed in another world.

As bad luck would have it, however, this other world appeared to be largely composed of swamp – cloying, muddy swamplands shrouded in thick, concealing walls of reeds, all of it congealing pungently beneath a sickly grey sky.

Immediately, her feet splashed down into several inches of cold mud, sending an ice-cold chill running all the way from her ankles to the base of her spine. Groaning, Elphaba wrenched herself free of the mud with an audible squelch, hiked up her robes and trudged out onto dry land.

"Now where are we?" she demanded wearily, as she stumbled up the embankment.

We're in another Conceptual Realm. On the upside, this one's a lot safer than the Realm of the Perfect World and the Realm of Endless Revolution, but something tells me you'll like it significantly less than both. Alas, this is the most direct route back to your point of origin.

"So what's this Conceptual Realm built around?"

Look through the reeds and see. The next portal's just beyond, anyway.

Elphaba cautiously parted the nearest veil of reeds, expecting the worst. To her surprise, what lay in the clearing beyond was little more than a crudely built village of improvised shacks and huts, most of them in the process of sinking into the mud around them. Elphaba could sense the portal floating just beyond the outermost hut, but she soon found her attention drawn inexorably towards the locals.

The villagers, morose-looking figures with roughly-woven clothes and permanently-slumped shoulders, lurched miserably around the field. Some tried to make repairs to the hunts; some worked on sickly-looking miniature farms, struggling to raise crops in the poor soil; some hauled in meagre-looking hauls of scavenged food; most, however, just sat around and cried in corners, completely dispirited. And then, Elphaba pushed aside the nearest bank of reeds with an audible rustle, and as one, every single villager turned in her direction.

Elphaba had thought the Perfectionites were bad, and in many ways, they were: faceless avatars of idealized perfection and all-consuming intolerance were pretty horrible… and yet, the villagers of this strange place were somehow even worse.

Children's faces were not supposed to appear on adult bodies.

The dimensions were all wrong, the childish facial features horribly mismatched by the adult dimensions of the body, the faces themselves ludicrously out of proportion to the rest of the skull; it made the villagers look as if they were wearing eerily realistic masks positioned in the very centre of their faces. It shouldn't have been logical or even possible without the aid of some very amateurish illusion magic, and yet here it was: everyone in this realm was an adult with the face of a child.

This was pretty creepy on its own, but then the villagers smiled in unison – their faces erupting into childishly gap-toothed grins – and spoke in unearthly double-layered voices that perfectly blended the deep utterances of an adult with the piping lisps of a child in a way that made Elphaba's skin feel as if it were about to slough off and go for a brisk jog in the opposite direction.

"Who are you?" they asked as one.

"Are you here to help us?"

"You look as if you could be."

"You're beautiful."

"You're strong."

"You're clever."

"You're wonderful."

"Stay with us, please?"

"We won't survive without you here. Please, stay with us. Love us. Hold us. Own us."

"Tell us what to do. We're your slaves. Hurt us, abase us, rape us, kill us. We can be anything you want. Just stay with us. Please."

"We will do anything for you – build anything for you, kill anything for you. Let us build an empire for you…"

Then before Elphaba's stunned eyes, the villagers leapt into a frenzy of activity: assisted by several hundred reinforcements bursting out of their inexplicably roomy huts, they fell on the muddy field with howls of exaltation and began sculpting it into rudimentary shapes – shapes that rapidly became more and more intricate with every passing second. Like a swarm of ants, they flocked across the field at an impossible speed, shaping mud and soil and grass into the walls of a building with a skill that could only have been accomplished by magic.

Bit by bit, a castle keep was taking shape before Elphaba's eyes, and still the villagers weren't content with building a small palace for her: while defensive walls and cannons were formed around the fledgling citadel, another gang of villagers descended on Elphaba and began to tearfully worship her – kneeling before her, kissing her hands, showering her with flowering proclamations of love and devotion, even offering to abuse themselves in ways that would have made even the most depraved torturers shudder in disgust.

Through most of this minute-long encounter, Elphaba had been too shocked to speak or even move, but once the villagers started trying to kiss her feet and hug her legs, the invasion of personal space became too much for her to tolerate. Disentangling herself from the knot of worshipers, she hurriedly pushed aside her devotees and made a break for the portal.

"What the hell is this world?" she demanded as she fled, doing her best to ignore the shrilling column of villagers charging after her.

This is how the Wizard justified his acts, Roquat explained. This is how the Empress pictures her citizens. This is the world as seen through the eyes of a narcissist.

"Urgh. Sorry I asked."

The recitation of numbers began again, and ahead, the portal yawned open…

---

…and once again, Elphaba found herself in another world. This time, it wasn't a bog she'd arrived in, but the shores of a lake – an underground lake, still and motionless beneath a thick blanket of swirling mist, its vast body lit only by banks of cobweb-shrouded candelabra dotting the shores like trees.

It was hard to say, given the diffuse lighting, but the lake and the cavern that it occupied looked to be artificial in nature: far above her, she thought she could discern the shapes of arches and support columns, suggesting that this place had been hidden under a building – and judging by the size of this lake, it had to be a massive structure.

"Where the hell are we now?" she asked.

We're out of the Conceptual Realms for the time being and back into the Possibilities. From what I've been able to work out, this is Dorothy's world – Earth, albeit ten years prior to her birth, and at least a continent away from Kansas. This is the city of Paris, France.

"But how does this connect? How does following this route get us any closer to our destination?"

The links between worlds become less tenuous over time. You'll notice how the connections to you become more relevant as we progress.

"In that case, how does this connect to me? What relevance does Paris have to me or any of my friends or enemies?"

Shh! You'll see in just a moment. Now, see that gateway on the opposite shore? The next portal is just behind it, right under the covered mirror. Feel free to eavesdrop if you feel like learning more about this reality… but be careful: make sure the residents don't see you.

Elphaba hunched down low and began creeping along the rocky shore of the lake towards the heavy iron portcullis; as she drew steadily closer, she realized that the gate had been left slightly open, just enough to swim under if she could do so quietly enough. The entrance itself led even deeper into the underground, to a large chamber expertly crafted into what could only be a house, complete with a miniature dock at which a small gondola had been moored.

Peering through the grating, she found that the house was lit brilliantly by even more candelabras, allowing her to recognize the vast bulk of a pipe organ built into one of the walls. Around it, a smattering of bizarre luxuries decorated the chamber: silk sheets, embroidered cushions, bottles of wine, the rumpled remains of fine clothes, porcelain masks resting atop mannequin busts, and several intricate-looking clockwork toys – most prominent of which was a musical box adorned with the figure of a monkey playing the cymbals. Between the tawdry extravagances, paper lay in vast piles like snowdrifts, column after column of the stuff rising high into the gloomy air; from what little Elpahaba could see from here, most of it looked to be sheet music.

And in the very middle of the carnage, three figures sat on the floor, their faces stamped with mistrustful glares. The first two were quite clearly Elphaba and Glinda, the two of them largely unchanged except for a rather unpleasant-looking ring of bruises around Glinda's throat.

The other looked mostly normal, up until Elphaba got a closer look: whoever the man was, he was very tall and slender to the point of emaciation, his long-fingered hands and spindly limbs jutting out of his expensive evening clothes like the legs of a spider. Half of his face was hidden beneath a specially-made porcelain mask, and what little Elphaba could see looked as if it had been daubed with layer after layer of makeup – but even that couldn't quite disguise the unearthly pallor of the skin, the scabrous red tint to the lips, the strange golden tint to his deeply sunken eyes, or the way the mouth seemed just a little too wide for the face. But in the end, it was the white half-mask that drew her attention – for it looked almost impossibly familiar…

"How is your throat, Mademoiselle?" the man in the mask inquired.

The other Glinda gave the masked man a look that could have burnt the paint off a wall, but when she tried to speak, all that emerged was a muffled cough. "I'm fine," she croaked at last. "Never better."

"She's improving by the day," said the other Elphaba, icily. "How's the groin treating you?"

The man shifted uncomfortably. "I have said before that I was sorry-"

"Sorry is one of those words that doesn't really suffice under the circumstances, Monsieur. I'm not exactly comfortable with us being allies, but unfortunately, it seems the three of us are in this together for the time being."

Back on the edge of the lake, Elphaba very quietly slipped into the water; it took a lot of effort and more than a little magic to swim under the gate without making a sound, but somehow, she managed it.

"Then you have found no sign of a way you can return to this… Oz?"

"Not with the path between worlds fluctuating too wildly. We need a fresh source of magical power if we hope to create a portal back to Oz, and it seems as if you're our most likely source of information on the subject."

"What make you think I know, precisely? If you have done as much research as you claim, then you should know that I am not a ghost by any means, just an artist – an artist beyond the wildest dreams of lesser mortals, but no more than that. I am a master illusionist, a ventriloquist, a musician and yes, even a hypnotist, but I am no sorcerer."

"But I have reason to suspect you know of where we can find one. You travelled quite extensively before settling here in the opera house and, by all accounts, saw many strange and wonderful things – things which not even a stage magician could accomplish without the aid of real magic. You may have even learned a few of those things for yourself, perhaps the odd gesture or incantation, just enough to enhance your own skills."

By now, Elphaba had almost reached the nearest wall of the house, so she could see that, behind the half-mask, the man was glaring with unmistakable rage. "You are very well informed, Elphaba. Might I ask how you learned so much of my past?"

"Easy: I asked questions, usually while hidden under a veil, usually with Glinda's help. I started out with the myths and worked my way back until I had been able to distinguish the truth from the fiction. Eventually I was able to track down your old friend the Daroga, and he cleared up most of the confusion. The rest I learned from the survivors: Carlotta Gudicelli, Richard Firmin, Gilles Andre, Madame Giry, Raoul de Chagny… and yes, even Christine."

The distorted half-face softened appreciably. "Was she… well?" he asked, carefully.

"Considerably better now that she's leading a life of her own. She still forgives you, which is frankly more than you deserve."

Back on the edge of the wall, Elphaba began slowly rising into the air, levitating herself slowly towards the balcony-like edge of the house. It was yet another strain on her already-exhausted thaumaturgical muscles, but it was quieter and significantly subtler than trying to scale the wall by hand – or by crawling onto the dock in plain view of the others.

"You disappoint me, Elphaba," sneered the man in the mask. "Having been born into a life of isolation and torment, you should know more than anyone else the lengths that people like us must go to in order to be loved. You know how little the world cares for those cursed with ugliness; in truth, the two of us are more alike than you care to admit."

"You think I'd agree with what you tried to do, just because we're fellow outcasts?" The other Elphaba scoffed. "And you actually think that there's a serious basis for comparison between us? Oh grow up, Erik. We might have superficial similarities, but that does not make us alike. For one thing, when I found myself face to face with a despot, I rebelled against him. You bowed down and filled your pockets."

"Whatever do you mean?"

"Your period of employment under the Shah, remember? The rosy hours of Mazenderan? The torture chambers? The political assassinations? I don't recall ever hiring out my skills to the Wizard as a hired killer, that's for damn sure."

"And then there's what you did to Carlotta," rasped Glinda.

"I did nothing to the Signora. Any disaster that befell the prima donna were of her own making-"

"Including those special nightcaps you arranged for her?" The other Elphaba interjected. "The ones that you arranged to spoil her voice over time so you could eventually have her replaced, claiming she was 'seasons past her prime?' Carlotta Guidicelli has throat cancer, Erik; she's dying in hospital even as we speak, and it's all thanks to you."

"I might have known that Glinda's sympathies would lie with the old whore, but I never would have imagined that you of all people-"

"She might have been vain and arrogant in her glory days, but in the end, she was just an insecure diva afraid of losing her career. She wasn't a murderer, a kidnapper or a torturer, and she didn't deserve what you did to her, not by any stretch of the imagination."

There was a deathly silence, as Elphaba finally floated over the edge of the balcony and into the house proper, immediately ducking under the nearest desk before any of the three could notice her..

"If you find me so repulsive," said Erik at last, "then why should I bother to help either of you?"

"Because you care about your art. Ever since you returned to this place, you've been going to seed without inspiration: I've seen your latest half-finished opera, and it's the saddest thing I've seen committed to paper since Boq's attempts at romantic poetry. I mean, do you honestly think that the story of you running a carnival on Coney Island is the best you can come up with? And that ending, good god…"

The other Glinda tittered, immediately setting off another coughing fit.

"My point is, you need this mission just as much as we do. Otherwise, you'll never produce anything worth hearing ever again… and you'll never realize that you still have a life beyond your own obsession and heartbreak. There's a whole world of possibilities out there, Erik, and with magic, the possibilities only get wilder. All you have to do is reach out and take it. So tell me, do you want to spend the rest of your life down here with nothing but your artistic failures and endless self-pity for company, until even the legend of the Phantom of the Opera is reduced to nothing more than a tawdry joke... or do you want to take a chance and look for something better?

Another pause followed. Then, without warning, he reached up and – with trembling hands – removed his mask and set it down on the ground next to him… and as he did so, Elphaba dimly realized that she'd glimpsed this moment before.

By that point, Elphaba was creeping across the floor towards the covered mirror and only got a brief glimpse of the skeletal ruin that was the left side of Erik's face, but on the upside, the sight of it was more than enough to keep the other Glinda and the other Elphaba too distracted to notice her making a break for the mirror.

"Then let us begin," he said softly.

Elphaba had seen and heard more than enough for her liking. Without waiting to hear what Erik and the other Elphaba intended, or what Roquat was reciting this time, she flung herself at the waiting portal behind the mirror-

---

-And landed in yet another cavern.

On this upside, this one at least appeared to be a naturally-occurring cave, complete with black granite walls, the distant howl of the wind, and an impressive mass of befanged stalagmites and stalactites.

We're much closer to home this time, Roquat assured her, as she awkwardly hauled herself upright. I can confirm that we're in Oz this time. Unfortunately, we're still nowhere near those parallel universes in which Unbridled Radiance came to pass, so we'll have to keep travelling for a little while.

"Brilliant," sighed Elphaba. "Where's the portal this time?"

Behind this cavern's sole occupant. Look to the left, if you please…

Elphaba wearily turned to her left. At first, she found herself staring at what appeared to be little more than a rock formation squatting in the middle of the cavern, a rough mass of crags and stalagmites that looked as if it might give some enterprising spelunkers a hard time in the distant future. But then the rock mass shifted: its surface slowly rose into the air and then sank back down again, as if the entire formation was inflating and deflating before her eyes, accompanied by deep, booming, geyser-like growls. But as the thunderous roars gradually became distinct from the wind gusting in from outside, Elphaba realized with a jolt of horror that the rock wasn't merely pulsating, but breathing.

The "rock" was alive.

Thanks to the faint sliver of daylight streaming in from the distant entrance to the cavern, Elphaba could now discern the shape of a vast, muscular body covered in glistening black scales and dotted with daggerlike spines of bone. Though she couldn't yet see its head, she could just about recognize the improbably long, swanlike neck connecting it to the body, and the winding blade-studded tail stretching off into the distance behind it; if her calculations were correct, this monster had to be at least fifty feet long in its current stance, and if it ever stood up on those huge, claw-tipped hand, its head would probably brush the cavern roof.

But in the end, the height of this slumbering beast wasn't its most distinctive features. No, that honour went to the shoulders, framed as they were by a massive pair of batlike wings. Of course, there was only one thing this creature could be: after all, Elphaba had seen the Time Dragon Clock up close and heard far too many stories about dragons over the course of her life… but it was another thing altogether to see a real dragon up close.

Trembling, Elphaba began creeping around the outer perimeter of the cave, hoping against hope that she could manage to reach the portal opposite the dragon without awakening it. But just as she looked to be making progress, there was a distant shout from somewhere beyond the cave entrance, and Elphaba had barely enough time to throw herself out of sight before the dragon lurched back into wakefulness, drawing itself up to its full height with an almighty bellow of rage.

And as it did so, Elphaba realized with a jolt of shock that this dragon had a human face on the end of its frondlike neck – as vast and hairless as the rest of it, but undeniably human.

She'd seen this before, she realized: in that brief jumble of visions back in Greenspectre, she'd seen the dragon roaring at an intruder… but now that she could finally see it up close, she realized that she knew that face all too well.

Even with the scales, the fangs and the luminous red eyes, it was impossible to ignore her own likeness.

The Elphaba-Dragon roared its defiance for a full minute, before another shout from the entrance inexplicably silenced it. Suddenly contrite, the dragon lurched back into a sitting position, lowering its head to the ground as the intruder hurried up to it.

The intruder was, of course, another alternate Glinda. For perhaps a minute, the two of them spoke too quietly for Elphaba to work out what was being said; the other Glinda must have been practically whispering into the dragon's ear, to say nothing of how low the dragon had to be grumbling just to remain partly inaudible, and apart from a muffled whisper of "are you sure nobody followed you?" nothing could be heard beyond the gale-like howl of the dragon's breath.

Then, in a voice that sounded like a thunderstorm trying to whisper, the dragon with Elphaba's face whispered, "How long has it been since we last spoke?"

"About a month," the other Glinda replied.

"God. Feels like years. Time goes slow out here. Slower still when all you've got to eat are sheep. I tried to make sure none of them could talk, but it's hard to get answers out of anyone now; all they can do is scream."

"You don't have to be alone up here all the time, Elphie: the Emerald City's changed a lot since you left – you might actually be welcome back there now."

"No. I'm sorry, but no: I've been a prisoner already, and once was more than enough. Last time, they at least had the decency to give me a garden to wander around; now, with the way I've grown since then, I'll be lucky if they can give me an elephant enclosure. Besides, I'd rather not find out what Madam Morrible will do in her next attempt to make me normal."

"Madam Morrible isn't going to be a problem anymore: she's in prison."

"You're joking."

"No, really. As soon as the Wizard found out about what happened, he had her fired for gross incompetence… and then, once he realized that there was no way of undoing what she did to you, he had her arrested. She'll be lucky to walk away with ten years in Southstairs if it turns out that your transformation was an accident; if she actually wanted to turn you into a dragon… well, it'll be a life sentence, maybe even execution."

"Do you actually think it's possible? I mean, she was using the Grimmerie, and we both know just how unpredictable it can be. Besides, the procedure was meant to make me normal and it was being carried out on the Wizard's orders; Morrible isn't the kind to take foolish risks, so why would she endanger her position and her life just to turn me into a dragon?"

"Well… we found some things in her chambers – collars that could be used to control higher brain functions, reins and harnesses that she could have used to magically command the wearer, stuff like that. Even notes – suggestions on how far your power could rise in possible outcomes of the spell. Maybe she wanted to tame you on behalf of the Wizard, or maybe she just wanted to stage a coup and take over Oz with you as her trump card. One way or the other, Morrible swears that they were being kept as precautions, but the Wizard wasn't hearing any of it. He had the entire collection burnt and had Morrible thrown in jail." There was a pause, as the other Glinda bit her lip. "He wants to know if he can meet with you."

Dragon-Elphaba laughed. "What the hell for? I'm not going to be his grand vizier now, am I? True, I'll probably be useful to someone as a living war engine, but I very much doubt he'll be able to force me to do as he commands – especially now that he's destroyed his only means of controlling me."

"No, it's not that. I, um… I know it sounds hard to believe, but I think he genuinely wants to make things right: I mean, he's been scaling back the anti-Animal laws ever since your transformation, even trying to have some of the worse cases cured; he actually suggested having you exonerated."

"And why would he do that, exactly?"

"I don't know… but it's something to do with the little green bottle he took from your belongings. Ever since he found it, he's been obsessing over it."

"Fitting. He couldn't have kept my hat or anything like that; no, he just had to go for the prettiest thing I own, the old magpie. But listen to me, grumbling about clothes! I haven't been able to fit in human clothes for nearly five months now, not since my transformation."

"You could come back, you know. With all the strings the Wizard's been pulling in your favour, you'll be given a very comfortable home. Okay, I know the chances of you being cured are pretty close to zero, but… well, it's better than living out here, all on your own. Besides, imagine the looks on their faces when you fly back to the Emerald City like this!"

Dragon-Elphaba's face contorted with regret. "I can't. I'm sorry, but… I'm really not up to travelling."

"Why not?"

The dragon coughed uncomfortably, and she mumbled, "It's… complicated."

Other Glinda's eyes narrowed suddenly; for a moment, she eyed the dragon's body with something that looked uncannily like suspicion. "Have you put on weight?"

Without saying a word, Dragon-Elphaba shook her head, the swanlike neck weaving with unearthly grace.

Curiosity clearly piqued, the other Glinda crept closer until she was within arm's reach of the dragon's scaly underbelly, and then put a hand to the other Elphaba's stomach. A moment later, she leapt backwards at such a speed that Elphaba briefly thought she must have burned her fingers; for a moment, she could only stare in shock, obviously unable to believe whatever she'd just noticed. But then she took a deep breath, and once again put a hand to the dragon's ever-so-slightly swollen belly.

Her eyes widened in astonishment and awe.

"Is that..."

"Yes," said dragon-Elphaba.

"But I thought dragons laid eggs," other Glinda whispered. "I mean, that's what all the stories claim."

"Maybe they do. As I'm sure you can tell, it wasn't a perfect transformation. Maybe if I hadn't been pregnant at the time, I might have transformed all the way into a dragon. But there's a lot of maybes about this predicament – more than I'd like. Maybe I can carry this to term, or maybe my new body won't be able to sustain it. Maybe my child will be as intelligent as I am, or maybe it'll be as mindless as any of the Animals I couldn't save. Maybe I can find a place where the two of us can live in freedom, or maybe we'll end up spending the rest of our days in captivity. Who knows?"

There was a deathly silence.

"It's Fiyero's baby, isn't it?" Glinda asked quietly. "He said he'd visited the prison once or twice before the procedure began."

For the first time since the conversation began, the dragon looked genuinely tearful. "Glinda, I'm so sorry, I-"

"No, it's okay. Really. Fiyero and I… it's over now. Truth be told, I don't even think it ever started, really. We're still friends and we still care very deeply for each other… but he doesn't want me. He wants you – and before you say anything about how that'll change now, he'll love you no matter what happens to you. He'll love you even if you'd transformed into a giant slug. He loves you, and if you give him a chance, he'll be here in a heartbeat, ready to stay here in this cave to help you and the baby. And the same goes for me."

"You stay here with me? You'd give up your life in the Emerald City just for me?"

"Without hesitation."

A gigantic tear rolled down the side of dragon-Elphaba's face and hit the ground with an almighty hiss. "You're a good friend, Glinda," she whispered, voice trembling almost out of control. "A much better friend than I deserve."

"Hey, don't talk like that: you know as well as I do that you were always the better of us, even after you helped me grow up. Besides, how else am I going to become an honorary aunt to a baby dragon?"

The dragon let out a snort of surprise – a snort that erupted into laughter. Before long, the two friends were lost in a gale of helpless giggles; it was the most ridiculous sight in the world – a pregnant dragon and a fashionista witch sitting together in a dank cavern somewhere in the wilds of Oz, laughing themselves silly – and yet it was probably the most wonderful thing Elphaba had seen so far.

But alas, Elphaba couldn't sit around watching forever. She could already feel Roquat getting impatient, could already hear his whispers: you need to keep moving before the synch sets in; the longer you wait, the harder it'll be to leave – and it'll never be impossible, but do you really want to experience the pain of leaving a world you've synchronized with so thoroughly? 0-980.9954565399…

So, while the two of them were still distracted, Elphaba hurried around to the opposite end of the cave, found the portal, and flung herself through it.

---

To her immense relief, she landed aboveground in the glow of a late-afternoon sun.

Apart from the sunshine, however, the surroundings didn't give her much hope at first: barren dunes rising and falling like the waves of an ocean, gigantic crimson mesas casting maddening shadows on the dust below, endless vistas of lifeless bone-dry earth studded with jagged fissures… In fact, the most promising sign was a small encampment about a hundred yards to the south, and judging from the ragged tents and the lack of sentries, it wasn't in good condition.

But then she looked again and noticed the distant shape of an airship half-buried in one of the distant dunes: even this far away, there was no mistaking the distinctive insignia of Unbridled Radiance painted on its hull.

"This is No-Man's Land," she realized aloud. "Does that mean-"

Unfortunately not, said the Nome King. We're in a universe that gave rise to Unbridled Radiance and the Deviant Nations, but it's not your point of origin: as far as I can tell, this is… a little too far ahead.

"What do you mean?"

You've already seen that time isn't necessarily consistent between dimensions: we've encountered a reality where you ended up in Paris circa 1880 instead of Unbridled Radiance circa 1940, and we've encountered an Oz set barely five months after Morrible tried – and failed – to degreenify you. From my observations, I've found that this dimension lies perhaps a year after your current point of origin.

"So we're in the future?"

A possible future. Perhaps it can never happen back in your world of origin; perhaps its time has already come and gone, and this is some other reality's possible future.

"Fair enough. Where's the portal?"

In the encampment to the south – somewhere close to the centre. Oh, and don't forget to stop and eavesdrop if you feel like learning more.

"How did I know you were going to say that?"

Nonetheless, Elphaba began the long, awkward stumble down the dunes towards the camp. As she gradually descended the sweeping hillocks of sand, she couldn't help but wonder a bit about the Nome King: with every single dimension they'd visited, he'd always made sure she'd witnessed the overwhelming majority of the details concerning each world, even advising her to listen in on conversations; in fact, he'd only gotten impatient once she'd heard everything worth learning about a particular reality. She doubted it was necessary for her to stop and sightsee with every world they'd visited, certainly not with the threat of aggressive dimensional synch hot on her tail, so what did he have to gain by making Elphaba learn as much as possible about each world? What was his end goal? Was he trying to stall her out here, trap her in another world out of some mad scheme for revenge? Or did was this some kind of secret learning experience, some means of teaching her hidden knowledge without actually going to the trouble of telling her anything?

In any case, she could only carry on as always – and hope that Roquat didn't actually have the power to read her thoughts.

The encampment had been a sorry sight from a distance, but up close, it looked downright dead: not a single sign of life could be found beyond the improvised gate; not only were there no guards at the entrance, but whoever had set this place up hadn't even gone to the trouble of setting up fences, guard patrols or even an alarm bell. A tattered flag still hung from a collapsed flagpole in the centre of the camp, and a quick glance at the faded insignia revealed that the encampment belonged to the Deviant Nations, but that still didn't explain what they were doing this deep in No-Man's Land.

As Elphaba crept by the rows of tents, she risked a quick peek inside each one, and found that of the thirty or forty tents erected, barely a handful of them were occupied: the inhabitants of those rare few were too weak to rise from their beds, and could only groan wearily at the intrusion, too feverish to respond to even the simplest inquiry.

The hospital tent was overflowing with bodies: from the looks of things, there were close to three hundred patients piled up across the facility, and after Lurline only knew how many hours left unattended, only thirty of them were still alive – and they were in even worse condition than the soldiers still in their tents. With every single cot occupied, the newest patients had been forced to lie on the floor while they awaited treatment, and with arrivals clearly outweighing the departures, every single foot of available space in the tent had been claimed by another bloody, vomit-streaked patient. She couldn't determine what disease had overtaken them, but whatever it was, it involved hair loss, haemorrhaging, and an awful lot of necrosis. It was also quite virulent: judging by the mage-surgeons positioned among the rows of infected, the plague had spread swiftly from the patients to the doctors, until the last members of staff had simply collapsed where they stood. From the looks of things, that had been the end of it.

Dr Kiln's body was slumped over the operating table, hands still shaped into surgical instruments, his eyes crimson and unseeing.

On the table in front of him, his last patient lay face-up in a pool of blood. With nobody around to complete the operation, the poor bastard had obviously bled out on the spot… but according to diagnostic spells, it had at least been quick.

Elphaba moved on as quickly as she could. The last thing she wanted was to end up synchronizing with this universe: just seeing this place was bad enough – reliving every excruciating would only add to her already-generous stockpile of nightmares. However, just as she made her way out of the hospital tent, she noticed movement around the commander's tent at the very centre of the camp; instantly, Roquat's senses picked up a distinct hint of the portal nearby, and Elphaba crept closer.

"…it won't be enough," a voice was saying – a voice that clearly belonged to another Elphaba. "You need to leave now, Dorothy, before it's too late."

"I don't care what you say," said another voice; once again, it was easy to identify the speaker, for even with the strange distortion to the voice, there was no mistaking Dorothy Gale. "I don't care how bad the odds look. I'm not abandoning you or the others, especially when you need me the most!"

The other Elphaba laughed bitterly. "Others? What others? Kiln's dead. Fiyero's dead. Brr's dead. Chistery's dead. Boq is beyond repair. Glinda is dying even as we speak… and I won't be long behind her."

"But what about reinforcements? Maybe Loamlark can send some people down, cure you before it gets any worse-"

"There's nobody left, Dorothy. The last of the Deviant cities stopped responding to transmissions this morning, and Unbridled Radiance is sending out automated emergency broadcasts – meaning there's nobody left alive to manage things over there, including Alphaba herself. The Empress' Judgement has swept the board clear: there's nobody left alive to oppose her… but on the upside, her precious weapon of mass destruction took her with it. Of course, it's not much of an upside given that we've no way of knowing if literally anyone else survived outside of a few vague pockets of immunity dotted across the map… so as of this morning, we're on our own."

She sighed deeply, and added, "And sooner or later, there'll be no-one left alive but you. That's why you have to leave now."

Tiptoeing closer, Elphaba sidled up to the command tent's flank, lowered herself to the ground and peeked under the canvas. As expected, the alternate Elphaba and the alternate Dorothy were standing by the map table and in the middle of a heated conversation… but what she hadn't expected was how diseased the two of them looked.

Her counterpart in this universe was clearly in the latter stages of the disease that had been inflicted on the camp, for her hair was almost gone, reduced to a few vague, withered locks trailing down the back of her battle-scarred scalp. Her skin had paled from deep green to a sickly greyish hue, and her face was studded with open sores and badly healed cuts. Worst of all were her eyes: gone was the mixture of anger and obstinacy that Elphaba so often found when she looked in the mirror, along with any real emotion that could possibly register on the face. The eyes of this alternate Elphaba were nothing more than bloodshot marbles in the hollows of her skull, as expressionless as coins on the face of a corpse: at this point, dying was just a formality.

The other Dorothy, by contrast, looked as if her body was in full revolt: across her arms, her neck and the lower-left side of her face, the skin had turned almost completely transparent, revealing the glistening red muscles beneath. In fact, the more Elphaba looked, the more it seemed as if the skin itself was disintegrating to expose the tissue below. The luminous eyes that she'd inherited from the Hellion were much brighter in this dimension, now casting an unearthly yellow glow on her surroundings even with daylight streaming in from inside. And though it was difficult to be sure from here, Elphaba thought she saw just a hint of fangs jutting from behind the alternate Dorothy's lips.

"You're not going to die out here," said the other Dorothy. "Not if I can help it."

"It's still better than the alternative: whatever magic the Empress used on us is bringing out the Hellion in you. The same radiation that's killing us is changing you, and the entire camp is saturated with it: do you want to end up like the Other Dorothy? Being alone in the wilderness might be terrible, but if you go full Hellion, chances are that the mental synchronization will follow the physical one – and then you'll be as mad as she was. Plus, there's still a chance to find other survivors out there – remote as it may be – and don't forget, you're still able to travel. I've barely managed to walk this far without puking blood."

"So that's it? I'm just supposed to walk out of here and leave you and Glinda to suffer through your last days. You're going to die alone, Elphie – if not you, then Glinda. Do you even understand the nightmare you're putting yourself through? It's going to take days, weeks even, and you're going to be in agony for every minute of it. I've seen the medical tent! I know how this works!"

The Other Elphaba groaned. "Of all the times in the world you could learn to be as stubborn as I am… Dorothy, as heartwarming as this is, it's quite effectively undercut by the fact that staying behind to plump the pillows on my deathbed is the single most pointless thing you could possibly do with your life. I'm going to die. Regardless of whether it takes days or seconds, regardless of whether I die alone or in company, or even if I leave with you, it doesn't change the fact that I'm going to die; as painful as it is, it will end. If you stick around here and transform all the way, you are going to spend the next few decades living the Hellion's life on repeat, maybe even forever if you're really as powerful as she was… and that's not a fate I'd subject my worst enemy to, let alone you. This is not a matter for discussion: you are going to leave this camp willingly or otherwise, and you are going to live your life! Don't think I'm not too sick to get the broomstick and fly you out of here, because if it means saving you, I'll do it! Now go!"

She turned to leave – and in that moment, the alternate Dorothy reached up with a hand glowing with ethereal energies and jabbed her in the back of the neck.

For a moment, the other Elphaba could only blink in astonishment, as if someone had just dropped an icecube down the neck of her dress. Then, she bonelessly slumped forward, glancing off the map table and crashing to the dirt in a heap of spasming limbs.

"What… what did you just do to me?" she gasped.

"I'm sorry, Elphaba," said the other Dorothy, sadly. "I didn't want to do this, but it was the only way I could save you."

"Save me? What are you talking about? And what's happening to my skin?!"

Under her tattered robes, the alternate Elphaba's body was beginning to shift and warp, her bone structure visibly remoulding itself before her very eyes. Even from her position at the back of the tent, Elphaba couldn't fail to notice the fact that her counterpart was beginning to shrink.

"You were right when you said the radiation was bringing out the Hellion in me," the other Dorothy continued; her voice was trembling with unshed tears, but she refused to stop. "Learning her old tricks is even easier now. For a while, Kiln had me using the paralysing touch to help in the medical tent when we ran out of sedatives… and that's how I figured out how to use the other kind of magic – the one she used on all her chosen favourites – and how to make it my own. Kiln had so many patients, he didn't miss the one or two I hid in my pockets."

There was horrified pause.

"Oh no… Dorothy, no, don't do this…"

"You see why I have to do this? You won't die now. You won't feel any pain. You won't suffer. It'll be just like what you did for Fiyero, only better, because I can make it so you'll never be unhappy and you'll never be alone… just like I'll never be alone… and I'll do the same for Glinda too."

"Dorothy, you can't do this!" Her voice was slowly beginning to rise in pitch, the words devolving into a childish shriek of terror as her clothes began to rapidly empty. "I don't want this! I don't want to be this! Just let me die! Let me die! LET ME DIE! LET ME-"

With one final infantile squeak, the high-pitched cries abruptly dwindled away into silence.

For almost thirty seconds, the tent was plunged into an eerie, sepulchral calm, broken only by the sound of the other Dorothy's choked sobs. Then, with trembling hands, the little girl reached into the vacant clothing left behind and held out a small hand-made doll of emerald-green cloth, its tiny ragdoll face smiling vacantly up at her with black-button eyes.

"Why are you crying, mother?" the Elphaba-Doll asked.

The other Dorothy took a deep breath, visibly blinking away tears. "Because I haven't done enough," she said. "Because there's still so many people sick and dying because of the Empress, and I haven't been able to save them. But I will. I will. Glinda's next… and anyone else left alive, and anyone else we meet. There's too much suffering in the world, Little Elphie, but we're going to change all that for the better: we're going to make a wonderful doll family of our own."

And with that, the other Dorothy – or perhaps the new Hellion – stalked off into the setting sun, headed straight for the occupied tents.

But Elphaba was already in motion: she'd seen way too much already, and with a terrible sense of gravity that could only be the sync bearing down on her, she didn't intend to stay here a moment longer. By the time Dorothy had reached the door, Elphaba was already diving under the table and flinging herself into the portal to the tune of yet another strange code...

---

A darkened room, now, oddly familiar to Elphaba's eyes – and all at once, she realized exactly why.

There in the darkness, another Dorothy was exchanging words with another Elphaba. Or rather, the other Dorothy was talking while the other Elphaba was singing.

"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-"

"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…"

And then, in the horrified pause that followed, the other Elphaba whispered familiar words.

"She's in here. We thought we'd gotten rid of her, but… she hung on. And I've been trying to… I've been trying to… But she won't let me, and… 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… Kill me. Please… kill me… before it's too late."

This time, the portal was hidden in the darkness less than a foot from her hiding place, so it didn't take much effort to slip away from the other Elphaba's desperate pleas and into the portal.

---

For some reason, the transition between dimensions was not instantaneous this time; indeed, the gap yawned into another section of void that she only crossed by virtue of sheer momentum. Fortunately, the next portal was directly ahead, perhaps half a mile away, allowing Elphaba a little time to take stock of things as she plunged onwards into the void.

"I saw that before!" she exclaimed. "That scene where the other Elphaba was begging for dead – I saw that in one of my visions. Twice, in fact! I thought that it could only mean that the Empress was going to be reborn in me… but it was just a glimpse of another word. So does that mean I'm safe?"

Don't get too comfortable with reality as you think it will, the Nome King warned. There's more than one way for a prophecy to be fulfilled: if you kill the Empress without the Amorphous League's potion, that little glimpse of another dimension might just become your future.

"Thanks for the reminder. I was worried I might actually be genuinely content with my life for a little while."

Aw, diddums.

"Are you just going to make fun of me? Because I was hoping to know a little more about our next port of call: from the looks of things, I'd swear we were getting close to our destination."

You'd think so, but things get a little knotty in this part of the void. We're going to have to take a slight detour in order to get back to the version of Unbridled Radiance you knew, but rest assured, we will get there."

"So… we're taking the scenic route."

In a word, yes.

"And why exactly do we need to take in the sights? What is so important about these dimensions that we feel the need to travel directly through the action, observing everything along the way while I'm supposed to be hurrying to avoid dimensional sync?"

What makes you think I'm making you observe anything? You do have a choice in what you can take an interest in, you know.

"And yet, you haven't pressured me to continue until I've seen everything worth seeing, unless my life's in danger. You've even encouraged me to take a look at what was going on once or twice! Plus, this isn't the first time in the void I've seen something I predicted earlier: the dragon with a human face, me being transformed into a doll, the white mask on the shore of the lake, the city of faceless people… it's like you're taking me on a tour of my visions! So tell me, Your Highness, what exactly are you trying to do?"

I'm not trying anything. I'm just your humble guide in the Land of What-Might-Have-Been. It might seem a bit sinister, but that's just part and parcel of the interdimensional house of horrors we travel though. It's like the Divine Comedy: you're Dante, and I'm Virgil.

"Who?"

Just a little something I once read through one of the portals. Granted, it's not easy to read over someone's shoulder through an interdimensional portal, but it's worth the effort. So, how are you enjoying the scenic route so far?

"It's been enlightening. Also, a little shocking to see Dorothy become the new Hellion, not to mention a little disheartening."

Why? It happened before, didn't it?

"I was at least hoping she might be able to escape what happened to her counterpart."

Perhaps she can. After all, you were paying attention to that conversation, weren't you? And if it doesn't work out, well… it's not entirely unexpected. You see, the Hellion is one of the oldest patterns in the multiverse: an innocent made monstrous through agony and horror, a harmless nobody that became feared and dreaded throughout the world. How many monsters lurking under the bed started off as the children cowering on top of it, I wonder? Even I began as just another anonymous worker delving through the bowels of the underground, a peasant in service to a king. Patterns repeat and repeat and repeat…

There was a pause, and then Roquat added, Brace yourself for confusion: this next world's a little bit out of the ordinary. Not to worry, though: "I have come to lead you to the other shore; into eternal darkness…"

---

Elphaba found herself shuddering to a halt at the back of a gargantuan ballroom large enough to double as an aircraft hangar.

All around her, marble columns stretched high into the vaulted ceiling, past murals of wondrous, heavenly realms, and into impossibly detailed frescoes of ancient battles between magnificently beautiful heroes and their disfigured foes. However, on the ground level, things became unexpectedly cluttered: Elphaba was now standing behind a huge bank of machines arranged like miniature skyscrapers across the back of the room; on the other side, a gigantic portal had been opened and now took up most of the eastern wall, a swirling maelstrom in the fabric of reality kept stable only by the countless machines flanking it.

From the looks of things, the machines in front of Elphaba were backup generators, supplied in such volume that it was almost impossible for her to make it past the barrier of equipment without flying. And with so much gadgetry in the way, she was completely invisible to the army of technicians operating the portal – and just as well: even at a distance, there no mistaking the fact that the head engineer was Purified.

This place could only be in Unbridled Radiance, maybe even somewhere in the capital city of Exemplar itself, but it obviously was quite different to the version Elphaba knew. For one thing, the skyline visible through the window was slightly different: Glinda had mentioned seeing posters vilifying the Deviant Nations, and intel had brought back numerous photographs of the city with similar propaganda on display, but if this was actually Exemplar, there was no sign of anything that even mentioned the Deviant Nations. There were no demonisations of the Mentor, no brutal depictions of the last atrocity that she'd been accused of, and no warnings of the "tortures" the Irredeemables inflicted on themselves; in fact, there were only warnings against deviancy and distortion in the vaguest sense of the word.

For another thing, the technicians were being presided over by Glinda – fully Purified and smiling like a mannequin.

The world on the other side of the portal was visible now: a conference room, by the looks of things, complete with a table sounded by men in unfamiliar uniforms – a rather uninspiring collection of greys and black tunics augmented with jodhpurs and far too many medals for their own good. Strangest of all were the insignia – the lightning bolts on the collars, the oddly-shaped crosses at the neck, the eagles on the caps, the tiny silver skull-and-crossbones, a sure sign that the wearers took themselves far too seriously for their own good.

Among them stood the Empress, dressed in her own simple white gown and circlet, looking ridiculously out of place among so many uniformed figures. The generals around her treated her with deference from the looks of things, but it was of a strictly formal, passionless kind, and judging by the uneasy looks some of the uniformed officials were giving her, they obviously didn't feel comfortable around her. Maybe she'd just conquered them… or maybe she was a foreign dignitary.

Eventually, the other Alphaba appeared to conclude her business at the table, shook hands with the generals one last time, and strode away to considerable applause. A moment later, the Empress stepped out of the portal and back into Unbridled Radiance.

"Welcome back, Your Radiance," said the other Glinda, raising her voice slightly over the roar of the portal closing. "How was your visit?"

The other Empress sighed, uncharacteristically annoyed. "Predictably frustrating. I feel our initial scout's appraisal was correct in calling them barbarians. I think human waste would be giving them too great a compliment."

"Then, we have no cause for a long-term agreement between us?"

"Hrmm. For now, these… people are our allies in the other world, however repulsive they may be. Unfortunate indeed that the portal didn't open literally anywhere else in the realm. However, this will only be a temporary measure: the barbarian dictatorship seems to think we can help them win the war they have plunged themselves into, but if they think we will waste our magic and our technology hauling them back from the brink of what their ugliness has wrought, they are deeply mistaken."

"Very well, Empress. What will be the plan of attack, then?"

"We will support them for the time being, provide them with the absolute bare minimum of troops, mages and war engines, just enough to satisfy their hunger for glory. Then, once our strategists have completed preliminary arrangements with the other major powers of the world, we can arrange for a coup d'état. With the dictatorship under our control, we can use our technological advantage and magical powers to arrange for a warm relationship with the other world leaders."

"You have made contact with them? I understand that such a thing would not be easy from the depths of barbarian high command."

"They have no capacity for magic, no matter what their ridiculous Occult Society might believe. It was a simple matter to telepathically reach out to receptive parties: the island nation to the northwest is one; their Prime Minister is a drunk, a boor and loathe to trust stranger, but he despises the barbarians as much as we do, and will accept an alliance."

"And the republic across the ocean?"

"Their Commander-In-Chief of the republic across the ocean was hesitant to join this conflict, and even more hesitant to accept my offer… but he is a cripple and one in poor health at that. I gave him Paragon's appraisal of his future: he'll be dead of a stroke by the end of the war. I've sent Dr Heart to him – on a stealth trajectory, of course – as proof of our good intentions. With any luck, the commander in chief will be on our side within a week."

"What of the General Secretary of the eastern union – the one they call the Man of Steel?"

"The same: for all their pretensions to equality and brotherhood, the union's been corrupted by the very sentiments they hoped to wipe out. The General Secretary is a self-important, power-hungry tyrant who smokes too much and drinks far more than he should; he was easy enough to tempt with the offer of technology… but the promise of Purification was more than enough to cement his support. Without it, little Jughashvili will be dead as his counterparts within a decade."

"Then our path is secured. How do you wish to deal with the barbarian dictator and his inner circle?"

"As soon as our troops are in position, I want the Leader out of his so-called Eagle's Nest and into custody. I want him taken alive: if he dies, he'll become a martyr for the rest of his debauched society, but if he can be imprisoned, we can negate their propaganda advantage. The Leader is weak, deluded, sick and drug-addicted; his people have no idea how far he's fallen from the ideal of their master race. Get enough footage of him sobbing for his next dose of amphetamine, and their morale will collapse."

The alternate Empress thought for a moment. "As for the others… well, the Deputy Leader is in prison anyway; the Chief of the Chancellory might be of some use to us if he can prove his worth as a political organizer outside the inner circle; the Foreign Minister is a joke, best disposed of as soon as possible; the Head of the Air Force is a drug addict, a vice-laden glutton with far too many preoccupations to be effective… but he was a renowned fighter ace once. Perhaps, if he can prove that he still has the skills to return to the cockpit, he might attain Purification… but if not, he'll be executed with the others."

"What of the head of security?"

"A loudmouthed weakling with pretensions of martial might. Apparently, he thinks that waving a flag for his Leader in a street march makes him a soldier. Furthermore, he's a coward. Paragon predicts that he'll bolt and try to ingratiate himself with us as soon as the tide turns in our direction; if that fails, he'll kill himself to escape prosecution. Rest assured, I want him alive to execute – along with his Blonde Beast and the hateful little bureaucrat assisting him. Then again, killing the Beast may not be necessary: Paragon suggests that assassination efforts are already being planned."

The Empress paused to gather herself. "And while we're about it, I want these ridiculous work camps to be shut down within hours of us taking control, and I want every single inmate provided with food, medical attention and adequate housing. Bad enough that the barbarians are persecuting a valuable segment of their own population on the grounds of some ludicrous myth of genetic inferiority and societal parasitism, but they've been wasting precious manpower and resources on a war of extermination in the middle of an actual war!" She took a deep breath. "Rest assured, we will earn international praise for shutting down this loathsome enterprise… and from there, supporters, converts, and even candidates for Purification. Perhaps even the former inmates will join our ranks. What a sight that would be for the imprisoned Leader – to witnesses the so-called inferior race claiming perfection ahead of his supermen!"

The other Glinda coughed polite. "There is just one other thing we need to discuss: what of the Propaganda Minister?"

There was a deathly pause, as the smile on the alternate Alphaba's face froze. "Oh… him. Well, Glinda, I'm glad you asked. I want that misbegotten bastard to live through everything that befalls him, even if we have to keep him on life support for the rest of eternity. I want him to witness his Leader collapse into trouser-soiling senility and die without a trace of martyrdom. I want him to see the people turn against his government, to see how his fabled Big Lie vanishes in the Light of Truth. I want him to observe how everything he stands for will be disproven, discredited, disregarded and destroyed. I want him to live to see his children denounce him and his wife marry another man, to see his friends deny ever knowing him and his work – his writings, his speeches and his asinine motion pictures – used as toilet paper by the culture that will replace his own. His name will be dragged through the mud for all eternity, and I want to experience every moment of his spirit being shattered and his mind being rendered down to nothingness. Only then, when that smug, smirking, self-satisfied Distortion-in-denial has finally consumed every last morsel of his defeat, will I finally allow him to expire. That is what I want done to the Propaganda Minister."

"I had not expected him to become so offensive," the other Glinda admitted. "When last he spoke, you judged him to be tolerable for the time being. What has changed?"

"What has changed is that the clubfooted little rat tried to… seduce me! He actually tried to touch me, thought he could have me and throw me away like one of his actresses! Bad enough that he balked at letting his Leader being seen accepting the help of a female ruler – these barbarians love their little "Children, Kitchen, Church" philosophy – but now he treats me like a whore on top of his earlier disrespect! Well, I feel it's time he paid for it."

"It will be done, Your Radiance."

"Oh, and Glinda? Paragon's stochastic prediction states that the Propaganda Minister's wife will probably try to kill her children when the Leader is captured. Make sure they're separated and given to responsible foster parents, would you?"

"As you wish, Your- wait… what was that noise?"

Unknown to both of them, the noise was Elphaba hastily diving for the dormant portal behind the second backup generator.

---

"Okay, Roquat, what the hell are you up to? You are subjecting me to far too many monologues for this to be a coincidence."

Whatever are you talking about?

"Something is up with this: you waited until the very end of that discussion before you showed me the way of there! And what's with these little detours through the void? And one more thing, why do you keep reciting numbers when we're passing between worlds?"

Let's just say that it's happening for a very good reason and leave it at that.

"That's not going to cut the mustard, Your Highness. Tell me what you're up to, or we're not budging another inch."

Bold as ever. Perhaps you've heard the saying "to be forewarned is to be forearmed?"

"Yes, but what the hell has this got to do with anything?"

You'll see. You'll need what you learn out here, Elphaba. Everything will come in handy someday: I know what happens to you without the knowledge you can gain out here; I know… I've seen it.

There was an unsettling pause, as the next portal dipped into view.

So you'll need every last morsel of what you see and here. Even this…

---

Once again, Elphaba found herself in another world, just as alien and unfamiliar as the last.

But was it?

She'd obviously arrived in a private residence, probably a very well-kept mansion by the looks of things, but despite the unfamiliar furnishings and wallpaper, Elphaba couldn't shake the feeling that she'd been here before.

Wherever she'd ended up, the house was full of shadows, the curtains carefully drawn, the corridors as quiet as a tomb. But then, just as Elphaba was beginning to wonder if she'd ended up in another apocalyptic dimension, a sound finally broke the unearthly silence:

Somewhere in the distance, someone was crying.

Bracing herself for the worst, Elphaba stepped into the darkness, ready to investigate…

---

A/N: Well, ladies and gentlemen, I apologise for one of the least subtle potshots at Love Never Dies ever, and for a spectacularly-badly disguised reference to a certain period of history.

In the meantime, anyone care to guess what happens next? Feel free to furnish me with your theories - and any corrections for the blunders that creep in late at night.