Strange Candy
Summary: On the turn of Charlie's twelfth birthday, a new threat to the factory arises. Charlie learns how important a friend can be. Wonka learns how difficult mentorship can be. Wonka/Charlie friendship, non-slash. Wonka/OC.
Notes: I have several important things to say. Here they are:
1) Through no intervention of mine, I am now destined to dress up as Willy Wonka for Halloween. My friend is going to be Veruca Salt (she bears quite the striking resemblance). Yes, I know I am female. Apparently, this is not a factor. Huh. Should be fun, if not expensive…
2) It was Green Day, Kokira. I didn't think anyone would get that, especially after I disguised it. And I've seen Corpse Bride, too. I love it…especially the music.
3) Thanks, Artoveli. Yes, he is. And, well…you'll know Veruca's involvement soon enough.
4) Ahh…you caught onto that, Lady of Light. Wow, someone thinks I'm clever! I'm a typo-freak, you know. I'll look into fixing those after I get this chapter up. Please tell me if you find any more!
5) Dear lord, this is a lot of reviews.
6) Linzy, you have supplied me with the most creative use of the words licorice and fox-money that I've ever read. I can tell you're also a writer, because you're very accurate in the way you describe the relationship between Mr. Wonka's "wonder world" and the cold, hard reality of the FBI agents. It's intentional. (And sorry…if it irks your, you're going to hate this chapter.) I love to contrast; it's in my nature…sorry? Again? And don't be wary! Heh, there's a reason the genre of this story isn't romance. You'll find Mr. Wonka's and April's relationship a little…erm…different than the norm. For every bit of fluff you find, you may kill me. Promise.
7) You're right, Laseri. My mistake. It's actually 'mum' and not 'mom', I'm just so used to the latter…. I'm no fan of Charlie/Wonka slash, either. Charlie, grown up or not, is and always will be, a kid to me. Thanks!
8) Ah, praise be to ye, Trilliah! I was once in a very similar, disappointed state of mind. And I'm glad you consider my fanfic as a 'little gem'…the very reference makes me glow momentarily. I shall continue to do my utmost best to keep you riveted!
9) SUPER LONG CHAPTER to keep you entertained and more-or-less sated about the fact that it took me forever to update.
I promised myself I wouldn't do that…remember, I try to reply to all reviews, but only if I can think of something clever to say back. Or to make fun of you. Either way.
I also would like to announce a little forewarning tidbit. The genre of this story is angst/suspense, and I'm holding true to that. The chapters hereon will get more serious. Not darker, exactly, but serious. And more bizarre. Mostly because I wrote this chapter while listening to Matthew Good's 'House of Smoke & Mirrors'. And praise Linzy, because she seems to caught onto the theme of the fanfic rather well…
Disclaimer: Consult previous chapter.
Chapter Nine: How Gallant the Knight
With the lights of the factory looming in the street ahead, Mr. Wonka stood motionlessly beside Charlie in the elevator. His eyes were not trained on the factory, however, but on the ground as they sped over rooftops and lampposts; the only sound of the night being the thrum of the engine that carried them so far above the ground. Charlie was as quiet as his lost ferret. What he seemed to be looking at slipped the chocolatier's mind.
In truth, Willy was not sure what he was looking for, either. Just…the city was so lifeless and boring. Half the reason he was so transfixed with it was the assumption that something must happen eventually. Did everyone really go to bed at the same time? Why were normal people so…so…weird?
From inside the elevator, a stillness stirred into an entirely different mood altogether. Surely Charlie was just excited about his new little brother. Or maybe he was bummed out about Oswald. Or maybe it was because Mrs. B wouldn't let him have any chocolate before bed.
It couldn't possibly be because of Mr. Wonka himself. Willy had to make Charlie promise what he promised, or something dreadful could become of him in the future. Charlie was his heir after all, not the other way around. Little chocolatier came before big chocolatier. Rules of chocolatiering, of course!
Something had to be done about those lawyer people.
The thought occurred to him like a green-and-purple sunset at noon. It was preposterous. He was Willy Wonka, chocolate whiz extraordinaire, yet what could he possibly do against an entirely different country?
April Banks.
Oh, believe him, Mr. Wonka felt just as mutually about Agent Banks as she felt so strongly about him. Well…perhaps not so ruthless. She was just as icky and unmannered as Valerie Silts or Austin Glomp, or…or whoever the other two were! He had to get rid of her somehow, someway make her go back to the USA! It was just all so darned perplexing…
And then, as if some strange, invisible wish faerie had heard his plea, his violet gaze looked over spotted Miss April Banks herself on sidewalk below, staggering towards his factory. She was very nearly there too, but she was walking awfully funny…like he said, staggering. There was no one else out on the street – but her.
That was it! He had to talk to her alone, where no one could intrude! Maybe he could convince her that he was innocent. Surely if he just talked to her, she would see reason and go back to wherever it was she came from. That dreadful, bullying friend of hers, too. It could work. It would work, he just had to—Mr. Wonka turned suddenly and prodded the 'stop' button on the vast panel beside him. The elevator jerked to a sudden stop in midair.
"Whoa!" cried Charlie, making his first sound since he'd left his mother's room. He fell against the glass wall after losing his balance. "Mr. Wonka, what's happening?"
"This is my stop, Charlie," quipped Mr. Wonka with a nervous laugh as the glass elevator began to descend towards the ground. "Listen, you go on ahead to the factory and I'll catch up, right after I take care of something of the utmost importance, 'kay?"
Charlie looked perturbed. "Why can't I come?"
Willy gave a derisive, but friendly enough snort. "Why don't dogs run backwards?"
When the boy realized that Mr. Wonka actually wanted an answer, he fumbled for one. And failed. "I…I don't know."
"Great. Neither do I." In a very pristine way, the chocolatier dabbed at the button that opened the elevator doors and stepped out onto the cold, windless street. "Make sure to tell the Oompa Loompas that I'm walking home, 'kay? I'll be back before you can say-"
"Mr. Wonka."
The violet eyes danced a little at Charlie's anxious tone. "Well, I was gonna say 'Snozberries', but yours sounds better."
"Mr. Wonka, you can't go," said his heir hesitantly.
"My dear boy, why ever not?" piped Willy, grinning.
At this, Charlie looked uneasy, as if trying to hide the fact that he was about to say something irrational. He glanced at his feet. "I'm not sure, I…just have a bad feeling, is all."
The attempt to be covert on the boy's behalf fell short of succeeding. Mr. Wonka peered down at him with the look of a patient teacher, the corners of his mouth upturned now in the slightest way.
"You promised me, Charlie," he said matter-of-factly. "You can't break a pinky-swear, you know. It's terrible back luck and goodness knows it takes lots and lots of good luck to run a chocolate factory!"
Charlie's shoulders slumped, but he bowed his head respectfully. "Yes, sir."
"Oh, come on," the chocolatier said. "What could possibly go wrong? Now hurry along and remember what your mom said! No cabbage or broccoli before bed!"
A thin smile appeared on the boy's face and he gloomily pressed the button to shut the elevator door. Just before it sealed tight, he pressed himself against the class and said meaningfully, "Please be careful, Mr. Wonka!"
With that, the elevator rose to the sky, carrying the chocolatier's heir and hope with it. Mr. Wonka stood for another moment in mysterious silence. Slowly, broodingly, he whirled around and started down the empty street, dashed with billowing snow.
April stumbled down the sidewalk, nearly colliding with a snowbank in her clumsy mêlée to stay upright. She burst out laughing as her shoes slipped on a patch of ice and she fell flat on her rump. For a full minute, she simply sat on the cold concrete, giggling hysterically. Then, with more effort than most people would require, she lugged herself to her feet and continued her dangerously tipsy journey.
Three nights ago, she had all but given up persecuting that damned chocolate bastard. It was like trying to open a five-hundred-pound drawer with no handle to hold onto. And then, of course, the thought of a giant drawer covered in purple velvet flashed into her mind and she fell over again, choking back her laughter.
That was not all she was choking back, either. She still had her last drink of the night, a small bottle of spirits covered in brown paper, clutched in one hand. More than half of its contents had ended up on the sidewalk rather than her stomach, which was probably for the good. April Banks practically had alcohol pumping through her veins by now.
She was hammered.
But she didn't care. Last night, one of the victims of chocolate poisoning had slipped into a coma. It was all over the news, but the spineless media had refused to put the details of the sixteen-year-old girl's condition in the report. Including why she had gone into a coma.
She was hammered, because she was a damned failure. That's right. A fucking drama-lacking, bottom-rung, low-down fiasco. She should have taken an easier case, like convicting the President for arson.
So April continued to hobble down the empty street, passing from one glowing lamppost to the other. She wasn't even aware of the hazy figure coming towards her at a brisk walk. Her blurry vision swept right past it. She stumbled on.
And suddenly, someone stood in front of her, blocking her path. Half-enraged, but mostly giddy, April stopped and snorted in laughter, lifting the bottle to her lips again. That giddiness all but faded, however, when she realized who was blocking her way.
She groaned and gripped the spirits even tighter. "What the hell…" She nearly lost her balance…again, but someone managed to right herself and her dignity…or at least, what was left of it. "The hell…do you want?"
"Ew," said the man of focus, bringing the back of a violet-tinged hand against his nose. "You smell worse than spoiled chocolate when it grows all that white mold and starts putrefying."
April's cheeks grew hot with irritation. "Is that why you're here…?" she said, glowering. "To insult me? I know you'd just love to kick dirt on me when I'm on the ground, wouldn't you?"
"Hmm," came the truly contemplative reply. Mr. Wonka showed an optimistic grin. "Can't say it didn't cross my mind," he said brightly.
"Wise guy," she said and swore. "Move outta my way. I'm busy."
As she shoved past him and staggered on, she heard him ask, "Doing what?"
She whirled around lazily, extending her booze hand high above her head in a graceless arch as she stumbled backwards. "Drinking," she said, giggling. "Wandering aimlessly. Drowning in the toxic waste of my own pathetic failure…what, hey!"
These last things she said in weak protest when Wonka grabbed her booze-less arm and pulled her off the sidewalk into a dimly lit alley. He didn't go far, however, but moved her out of the light of the streetlamps so that her back was to the alley wall.
At first, April's first reaction was to hit him, but when he made no threatening moves towards her, she sniggered instead. "You're not gonna frisk me, are you?"
"Uh, no," said the chocolatier in a repulsed, 'duh' kind of way. "And even though I shouldn't be nice to you, I will be anyway, because that's what Charlie would do."
"Really. I'll believe that when I see it," she spat. "So what do you want? Money? My jewelry? Sex? There's a whole list of things I'm sure you'd love to get from me. "
To her surprise – though she hid it skillfully, despite her drunkness -- he looked rather confused by her accusation. Wonka made a tight-lipped expression. "No," he said in a slightly chagrined way. Then, because he could not help his overwhelming curiousity, he added, "What's sex?"
Which earned him a well-aimed snort. Unfortunately, April happened to have a mouthful of vodka at the moment and half of it escaped through her lips in a spray. Willy stood, quiet as a statue, and wiped the front of his coat in a casually disgusted manner.
"'Kay…never mind," he said distastefully.
"What do you want already?" she groaned, slumping against the wall. "It's fucking ten-thirty at night, and you're saying you just happened to stop me for a friendly tête-à-tête?"
"You know, you're a very unfriendly person, and my father always said that unfriendly people don't have any friends," the chocolatier remarked wittily. "Didya ever think of that?"
April eyeballed him with the approach of a snake towards a mouse. "Oh, this is rich. You want to be my friend? Mr. Wonka, you my not have noticed, but I'm an FBI agent. I've spent the past week trying to pin your for attempted murder, fraud and child molestation – without success, might I add. My partner pulled a gun on you. He nearly shot you. I'm not your friend. I'm your worst nightmare."
At this, Willy snorted. "No you're not. My worst nightmare was about flying Hornglobbers. Believe me, compared to a full-grown Hornglobber, it's next to impossible to be scared of anything else."
"Really," was the lazy reply. She took another drink from the bottle, only to find that it was empty. She swore arrogantly and threw the bottle at the dumpster just across the alley. It smashed on the lid and clattered into the empty bottom of the container. "Look," she said, turning to him with a miserable expression. "I'm wasted. At this point, I don't care if you put a gun to my head and pulled the trigger. You won, I lost. That's all she wrote." She pushed herself away from the wall.
"Wait." Mr. Wonka side-stepped in front of her before she could escape. "I just have…one…question," he said, holding up a finger to punctuate his request.
Her eyes rolled into the back of her head. "Ask," she groaned.
The chocolatier slowly dropped his arm to his side. "Do you really…I mean really really, honestly, not-even-slightly-doubtful, deep-down, wholly and truly believe all that bad stuff about me?"
It was not, in a way, at all the kind of question she would have expected from him. It was bad enough he was being too much of a prick that he wouldn't laugh at her or flaunt his victory (she would have very much preferred that over this false, morale façade), but now he was pretending cordiality, too? But then, it was a fair enough question. She wasn't even sure if she could give a straight answer.
April sighed and placed a hand on her forehead, with her eyes closed in concentration. After a moment, she opened them again. "Mr. Wonka-"
She felt the cold steel on the back of her neck before she heard the click of a gun being cocked. A restless, gravelly voice spoke from behind. "Don't move, or I'll blow your goddamned head off."
A surge of panic rose in her throat, mixed with anger and surprise, but was cooled almost immediately by her many well-trained years of agent experience. Her eyes darted accusingly towards Mr. Wonka, thinking that he had somehow arranged this. It did not take long to realize that he was in much the same situation as she. A tall man stood behind the chocolatier, his face covered with a dark wool mask. Although she couldn't see a gun, she was sure the man had one pressed into Mr. Wonka's spine.
"We were told you'd be alone," her subjugator whispered harshly into her ear. "Now, Miss Banks. We wouldn't want him to end up like your boyfriend, would we?"
April's nerves blazed as every inch of her burned with an intensity befitting a rabid dog. There was no possible way that any typical mugger could know about that. She was dealing with two men who were well-versed with their homework. And she could not reach her gun even if she dared to try. He would shoot her, and there was so way she could kill them both without a high risk of hitting Mr. Wonka instead.
Her stomach roiled as she shifted her thoughts back to the man's comment. How could they know? Hadn't the loss of him been enough? She swallowed, keeping her eyes firmly directed at Mr. Wonka. "How…do you know about Truman?"
"Friends," hissed the man, pressing the barrel of the gun deeper into her skin. She shuddered with revulsion as he leaned forward and inhaled deeply. "You smell nice, Miss Banks. It almost makes me wish I didn't have to kill you."
"And why is it you have to kill me?" she replied coldly.
"The same reason we're gonna have to kill your friend." The gun shifted to her back. "Now, I wouldn't be very good at my job if I told you who sent me. Although I'm sure that's what you're really wondering."
"But you need me," she pointed out, without flinching in the slightest. "Or else you would have killed me already. Assassins don't usually talk their victims to death."
A harsh laugh soon followed. She could feel the heat of it on her neck. "You FBI types don't miss a beat, do you? All right. We need you. But first…let's take a little walk."
The man's colleague took this as a cue and roughly shoved Mr. Wonka forward, towards the deeper end of the alley. There was very little light further in, and no place to run. Clearly, the chocolatier had a good enough mind not to protest, but the look of absolute terror on his pale face reflected in the light of the streetlamps before it vanished into the shadows. It also reflected in April's eyes.
Suddenly, Willy Wonka did not seem like such a wicked person.
She had little time to think further on the subject, for the man behind her suddenly seized her by the hair and began to drag her into the dimly lit alley. When they stopped, she saw that the other armed man had pitched Mr. Wonka against the dank boards of the wall at the alley's end. When she was finally released, April stood her ground expressionlessly.
The man who had previously been behind her now moved into the open. He was well-built, but his face was also concealed by a ski mask. His gun was leveled at her as he moved towards his partner.
"You can imagine how upset my employer would be if I simply let your friend go," said the husky assassin. "He'd also be quite pissed if I just shot you and got it over with. Bullets are traceable, Miss Banks. But you probably already knew that."
Oh, god. She knew where this was going. Oh, god, oh god…this can't be happening. There has to be a way out of this. A loophole. Something.
"So I'm gonna make you a little proposition," the man went on. He lifted his gun so it was level with her head. "You're gonna take your gun, and put a bullet in his head," he said, pointing artfully towards Mr. Wonka. "Then you're gonna put a bullet in your head. Are there any questions?"
"You're an asshole," she said with suppressed anger, "if you think I'm going to go through with that. You can just as easily take my gun and do it yourself."
"See, that would be where you're wrong," he growled. "It just so happens, Miss Banks, that I'm a sick man. At least look at the bright side. No more poisonings."
And this was what Mr. Wonka could not bear to hear. Blank-faced, he pointed at the pair of thugs. "You've been making people sick!" he exclaimed. "With my chocolate!"
"Our job isn't nearly as colourful," said the second man, speaking for the first time. His gun-arm was trained on the chocolatier without so much as a twitch. "But we try."
Without warning, April's captor reached out and seized the handle of her gun from its holster, which resided in her jacket. He held it out with a gloved hand. "At least we're giving you the option, princess," he remarked.
He shoved the gun into her hand. She nearly dropped it in disgust, but remained as rigid as a post when he stepped back and dug the tip of his own weapon into her scalp. April closed her eyes, and slowly lifted her arms to aim the gun at the chocolatier. She even managed to remain inexpressive when Mr. Wonka recoiled slightly, making a sound that sounded extraordinarily like a child's whimper.
For a suffocating moment, no one moved.
There was a hollow click. April pressed down on the button on the side of the grip. The gun clip clattered to the ground. In the same, no-bullshit manner, she pulled at the top chamber of the gun, emptying its magazine of the last bullet. Then she lowered her arm and loosened her fingers. The gun joined the clip on the ground.
"Wrong choice," rasped the man. He grabbed her hair and jerked his gun towards Mr. Wonka.
And then the alleyway erupted in a flood of light and sound. A great gust of wind pounded down on the alley inhabitants from above, momentarily stunning the two armed men. The one with a fistful of April's hair bellowed a curse and shot straight upwards, though where the bullets landed could not be told through the commotion. April was thrown roughly into the wall. Her head struck brick and she dropped, half-conscious.
Through the roar of the glass elevator's engines, Willy heard Charlie shouting his name. The elevator descended slowly, until its great floodlights no longer shone in their faces and it hovered several feet above their heads. It barely fit into the narrow alley and could not lower any further without endangering those who were below it.
Mr. Wonka reached towards the elevator, as if meaning to grab it. "Charlie!"
The second man did not waste a moment more, but instead grabbed Mr. Wonka by the collar and hauled him away from the wooden boards. That was as far as he got, however, before a very small body leapt upon him from above. A split moment later, three more little men came plummeting from the elevator, armed with a vibrantly striped rope. With curious professionalism, they looped it around his thick neck and used their combined weight to toss him backwards. He was down.
As soon as the Oompa Loompas had made their fall, Mr. Wonka found himself pitched forwards. He landed roughly on the paved ground, jarring his chin on something oddly shaped. It was Miss Banks' shoe. His head snapped up as he half-rose off the ground and saw her struggling to stand up, still disoriented from the bump on her head.
But now, despite Charlie's fruitless yelling and the efforts of the Oompa Loompas, the second man had dislodged them by flailing his arms. The first one, April's captor, was busily batting them away as they slid down ropes from the elevator floor and continuously barraged him. They were doing what they came to do: buy their employer time to escape.
Without thinking, Willy seized Miss Banks by the sleeve and started pulling her towards the street. Luckily, she was recovering quickly and responded to his intent, stumbling after him in a blindness that nearly made her careen into the wall again. The two men immediately became aware of their quarry's intent to flee and tore themselves out of the squalling platoon of Oompa Loompas, guns drawn. They fired simultaneously as they ran, aiming clumsily for the retreating backs of the chocolatier and the FBI agent.
Sparks erupted from the metal dumpster as the bullets missed their marks. They ducked and ran, April following Mr. Wonka in a heedless manner. Stumbling again, she yelled and paused only long enough to reach down and yank the horrible high-heeled shoes from her feet. Then she continued to run barefooted.
Gunshots from behind told them that their pursuers were not yet shaken. April knew for a fact that simply running was not going to save them. Sooner or later, a lucky bullet would strike. They had to take cover somewhere, or hide, or—
Yet there, straight ahead, no further than two hundred feet or so, were the gates to Mr. Wonka's factory. She had been so entirely drunk, so petrified, that she hadn't been aware of how close to the facility she was. For the first time, and probably the last, she was absolutely delighted to see it. More than delighted. Ecstatic. The possibility of refuge refueled her weary, aching body whilst she rushed on.
She was only dimly aware of the startled voices of the few people who dared look out their windows. She only saw the blue velvet coat of the man in front of her rippling as he fled for his life. The sound of his laboured breathing, the solid thudding of boots striking the pavement. The shots as they rang out in their wake.
For a moment – a blind one, for everything was jumbled together – she swore she saw him stagger. Just a split second. Then it was naught but imagination. They raced through the gates, under the stone arch and into the vast, gray courtyard.
The men were right behind them. No more shots were being fired, likely because they were out of ammo and were still crazed by the buzz of the chase. In a flash, April saw the two little men (impossible!) on the inside of the door to the factory. They were sitting in machines that resembled turrets, painted in bright colours to match their eccentric uniforms; one on either side of the door. The puppet display was gone.
Soundlessly, the two turret-like contraptions turned to target their pursuers. It was only a glimpse she saw of the small man-like creature sitting in the machine to her left. But she swore that he was smiling. Or rather, smirking.
The turrets fired. Two swirled, fist-sized, round globes shot straight into the faces of the men as they reached the steps, dead on. The projectiles exploded with bursts of disgusting green goo, covering their cheeks, foreheads and necks heavily. However, the force of their impact had already knocked them out cold and they dropped like stones.
Too distracted by happenings inside the factory to care, April reeled on her frostbitten feet past the turrets and nearly toppled over Mr. Wonka, who knelt curiously on the floor just where the red carpet of the hall met the stone of the entranceway.
She stepped back in surprise when the two small men in the turrets leapt from their posts and ran towards the frozen chocolatier. It was then she saw that Mr. Wonka was scrambling to remove his blue velvet coat as if it had caught flame. She approached him, a sharp inquiry on his behaviour lying on the tip of her tongue.
Until she saw the red stain.A bullet had clearly skimmed his shoulder, laying out a deep, bloody gash.He was looking at the blood on his palm as if seeing it for the first time. His face was even paler than normal, bordering insane disbelief.Then, slowly, he lowered his hand and whispered, "Charlie."
Charlie…? April shook her head, not grasping his meaning.
A second later, she understood with a lurch of queasiness. The blood on Mr. Wonka's fingers was not his – his wound was too far out of reach. If it was not his, then there was only one other possibility...
The blood was Charlie's.
AN: Threw you off by the sneak peek, didn't I? Don't worry. I won't do it again. Promise.
Funny Word Glossary
Hornglobber: Ever more terrifying than a Whangsnozzer or even a Vermicious Knid. Basically a globule creature with hundreds of small horns sticking out its back like porcupine quills. Each little horn is filled with poison, and though rare, are well-known for preying on Oompa Loompas in their natural habitat.
Sneak Peek: Charlie's fate, Daniel's fate, April's fate, Mr. Wonka's…ah, heck. The fate of everybody.