Um, UPDATE! my half of this chapter was extremely long, so I decided to split it into two chapters.Chapter three to come soon. In this chapter are tributes to 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind', and Rent. Enjoy! Oh, and review, or I'll sic my mice-minions on you.
...or maybe I'll just cry.
Meanwhile, Sara is getting sleepy after her animated re-telling of the day's happenings.
Sara lied down against a wall in the tunnel, put her head on her arms and shut her eyes.
"What are you doing?" Elphaba asked
"Sleeping. Is that alright?"
"Oh it's fine." Elphaba answered, "This way, when you wake up and find yourself covered with centipedes and maggots, I'll be too far away to hear you scream. That's perfectly alright."
Elphaba was trying very hard to keep her newest annoyance awake through the night. She was getting more and more frustrated because her attention was split between her safety and Sara's whereabouts as she tried to continue on her route out of Oz.
"Will you help me find my cousin?" Sara had asked, "you don't have to go into the emerald city, obviously, but could you draw me a map? Or give me directions? Or both? Both would be good."
"Yes of course," Elphaba had lied, "but first let's travel together part of the way there. You're really stupid if you think you can survive in this forest without weapons."
Sara had made yet another baffling remark to weapons, "Ha." She scoffed. "You haven't met my foot."
But she had followed like a very good dog for the first hour or so. After that, she started to get way too energetic, and tried to talk to Elphie along the way. "What's this tree called? Do you have Jackelopes here? I spy with my little eye..."
Luckily, (or so Elphaba thought at the time) this phase did not last long. Pretty soon Sara had skipped, galloped, crawled, somersaulted, and talked up all of her energy, and got very quiet. Elphaba had breathed a sigh of relief.
At the moment, however, Elphaba found herself wishing for the more rambunctious Sara she had been with a few hours ago.
"Sara!" Elphaba whispered fiercely. "Wake up!" She took the girls arm and yanked her away from the tree she had leaned against.
"Humhua What?" Sara stammered, waking up and gaining her balance. "Sorry."
"For the last time, STAY AWAKE!" Elphaba said, her fury boiling over.
The sight of Elphaba with her eyes flashing in rage normally would have scared Sara out of her wits. In the state she was in right now, however, she merely smiled weakly and said, "yes mommy" before her eyes shut and she passed out with a thud.
Elphaba bent down and slapped her, the clap sending a surprising echo through the forest. She was letting her anger get the better of her, but she didn't much care at the moment.
Sara didn't even stir. Elphaba scowled at her and waited for her to wake up like she had before. Instead, Sara snorted and then giggled in her sleep, rolling over onto her side and curling up.
Elphaba didn't have time for this. She was way behind schedule, and she needed to be at the next checkpoint in less than an hour. Briefly she toyed with the idea of leaving the girl there, before she realized that if anyone found her they could pump her for information about the Witch. She couldn't take that risk. Elphaba grabbed the girl by the armpits and started to drag her along the way. A couple of feet down the way, Elphaba decided this was not going to work. She collapsed against a rock, panting. Altogether beyond her fortune, Elphaba looked over to find that she was not too far from a shady cave. Encouraged a little, Elphaba got up and again grabbed Sara by the armpits and started to drag her towards the cave.
When they were about 3/4 of the way there, Sara woke up, stuck her arms and legs straight out in front of her and whispered, "Joel..." and then let out a satisfactory little laugh. (That was my tribute to ESSM)
Elphaba didn't trust her wakefulness to last, and continued to tug and heave her body across the forest floor.
"Watch this!" Sara said suddenly, and got her feet under her and pushed off, sending her and Elphaba flying backwards.
Elphaba let out a painful "oof" as her back slammed down onto the solid ground of the cave, and it was quickly followed by a more pitiful groan as Sara slammed down onto Elphaba.
"That cuts time, doesn't it?" Sara said as she got up and stepped over Elphaba's rigid body into the cave.
It took a minute for Elphaba to get her wind back, but when she did, she got up as fast as her aging bones could manage and readied herself to tackle Sara and beat the teeth out of her. As she looked around, however, she found Sara curled up between a boulder and the cave wall, fast asleep.
"I hate children," Elphaba thought as she walked past her young problem and further into the cave. She found a pitch black little cubby and tucked herself in it to sleep. Her head was spinning, but she had a feeling sleep and a drink of water would take care of it. The sun was rising anyways.
--
Elphie woke a few hours later, glanced over and found Sara hugging a big boulder and laughing at it in her sleep. The Witch got up, stretched, then went over to Sara and shook her. Sara suddenly became limp and fell to the side, her face finding a dangerous pocket between bottom of the boulder and the ground. Elphaba watched, but Sara did not move.
"I think I've killed it." Elphaba said with a tone half full of disdain and half of surprise. She didn't think she was having that much negative feelings towards her at the moment. Maybe they had built up from that night. Still, she had to be sure before she continued on. She knelt down next to Sara's body and shook it again. Nothing. She had killed it after all.
Elphie got up and stretched again, then started towards the entrance of the cave.
"I jumped over the moon!" Came a voice behind her.
"What?" Elphaba turned.
"A leap of...mooooooo!"
"What?"
"Stay here. I'm going to go get breakfast."
"No - we have to –"
"Travel in broad daylight? Do you really think that's a good idea? Besides, you look sick. When's the last time you ate a square meal?"
Elphaba was still too stunned by the normalcy of Sara's conversation to be cynical or biting. She thought for a minute, "I don't think I've ever had a 'square meal.'" She answered.
"Well, you know, that's probably why you look like crap."
"What?"
"You're shriveled and decrepit. You're stooped and weak. All because you don't eat. I'll be right back."
Elphie tried to protest, but Sara was gone before she could get anything intelligible out.
Sara returned in record time with two rabbits. Elphaba jumped up and immediately started protesting.
"I'm not eating those! How do you know they're not Rabbits?"
"Relax. I asked them. They weren't."
"They could have been mute Rabbits!"
"No, I didn't physically ask them with my voice, silly."
"Then what did you do?"
"Ok, see, animals are telepathic."
"And..."
"And Animals, like most humans, are not."
Elphaba tried really hard to protest, but didn't get anything out but a few short grunts. She was dumbfounded.
"Besides, I asked permission."
"You WHAT?"
"I asked permission?" Sara for a moment wasn't sure. Then she verified it in her mind and nodded at Elphaba.
"Whose?"
"The rabbits'."
"You asked the rabbits permission to serve them as breakfast?"
"Of course. I couldn't just murder them!"
"I–But–you—"
"Anyways, they said they'd be obliged as long as we promised to not waste anything we didn't have to. Do you know how to make mittens?"
"This is sick."
"No, it's resourceful. I'll get these cleaned up and ready. If you could start a fire it would be helpful."
"Are you telling me you're telepathic?"
"That took a while. Yes, I'm telepathic."
"Ok, read my mind!"
"Are you telepathic? 'Cause if not, I can't read your mind."
"Maybe I am. Read my mind!"
Sara stared at Elphaba's crazed expression for a moment, then blinked rapidly, very surprised. "Well," She swallowed, getting up. "That was not very polite."
Elphaba was extremely satisfied that Sara had correctly read her mind. She gathered sticks and rocks and reveled in it as Sara was doing some rather disquieting things to the corpses of the rabbits, and sniffling every once in a while. Elphaba didn't even realize that she was building a fire until she sat in it's warm orange glow in a daze and Sara shouted over her shoulder,
"Listen, do you eat liver?"
"I don't eat meat!" Elphaba cried and kicked dust into the flame, squashing it to smoke.
"You mustn't think of it as such a terrible thing. It's the order of life. Carnivores eat herbivores. When you die, if you're not picked apart by vultures and wild dogs, you melt into the plantlife, and then herbivores eat you. It's all equal."
Elphaba groaned.
"So no liver? I really don't think I can handle one, so if you don't want one I'll either have to throw it up or throw it out."
"Ugh. I'll eat it."
"Listen, do you have any pans?"