A/N: Italics are flashbacks...
A week passed without anything unusual happening. Olivia and Elliot found no new victims (but that didn't mean that new victims weren't out there), Marina had no new bursts of memory (or, at least, none that she shared), and Elphaba's wandering mind kept fixing itself on Jonn (ok, maybe it wasn't wandering).
One day, Elliot decided to leave the girls "alone" in camp. "I'll really be hiding nearby," he said. "I want to see those guys for myself."
Everyone agreed that this was the best plan, and it was carried out later that very day.
After being "alone" for about an hour, Kriss and his brothers returned to finish what they started. As soon as she saw them, Olivia stood up to face them while Marina hid behind her legs. Elphaba emerged from one of the tents as Kriss started talking.
"Hello, lovely ladies," he said, "I do believe we've met before."
Olivia grinned coyly and waved as if she was happy to see him. "Hi, Kriss."
Kriss stood there for about a minute as if expecting her to say more. "Oh, but haven't you met my brothers? This is Bertt, and Aarin, and Jeorge, and Jonn."
Elphaba's eyes widened and she shook her head. "No," she whispered.
Jonn looked at Elphaba, his eyes silently pleading with her. "Saint Aelphaba, forgive me!"
Elphaba stared at him, horrified. "I'm seeing things," she whispered, backing away. Olivia stared at her and even Marina peeked out to watch.
"Saint Aelphaba, I can explain-"
"I trusted you!" Elphaba screamed, her eyes sparkling with tears. "You were the first person I could ever trust! Why didn't you tell me?"
"Ah, Peridot," Kriss taunted, "you should've recognized my baby brother."
"Elphaba," said Olivia, "let him go…"
"You lied! You said I was beautiful!"
"No, my pretty saint, I didn't-"
"See, there you go again! Lying to me! I can't believe it!"
"No, Elphaba, it's not lying. It's looking at things another way."
Elphaba ignored him. She stormed into the tent and sat down curled into a tight ball, trying to fold into herself and disappear.
"I can't believe Elphaba didn't tell us about him," Olivia told Elliot an hour later.
"I can. My daughters never tell me anything."
"Even so…"
Elliot shook his head. "Look, Olivia, if it's bothering you this much, why don't you go talk to her?"
"I will."
When Olivia pulled back the flap of the tent, she saw Elphaba lying on her stomach resting her head in her arms. Olivia sat down next to her and put a hand on the teenager's shoulder. Elphaba's long black hair fell over her face like a veil when she looked up at Olivia, her eyes flooded with tears that hadn't overflowed. But Olivia noticed more than sadness in her eyes. For the first time, she saw the Wicked Witch of the West. She gasped.
"What?" snapped the girl, sitting upright with her legs extended in front of her.
"Jonn's out there," Olivia blurted out. "He wants to talk to you."
Elphaba stared at her. "Damn it!"
"What's wrong?"
"Tears," Elphaba explained, wiping her face with the hem of her dress. "They burn like hell." She got up and left the tent.
"Aelphaba!" said Jonn, relieved.
"Don't call me that," Elphaba said through clenched teeth.
"What's wrong?" he asked, walking towards her with his arms outstretched. She walked around him.
"Don't be stupid!"
"What'd I do?"
"What'd I say about being stupid?" But as hard as she tried, she couldn't stay mad. Her face broke into a wide grin.
"It's not my fault, Aelphaba! My brothers are control freaks!"
"Sure."
"No, really. All I am is a photographer."
Elphaba gawked at him. "So it was you."
He blushed. "Yeah. But I didn't want to! Kriss, he majored in sorcery at Shiz. Who knows what he would've done if I'd refused!"
"So you took pictures of him raping children?"
"I didn't want to! You don't know what it's like, none of you! Your own family, forcing you to use your talents in a way that you don't want to!"
Elphaba shook her head. "I do know…" she whispered.
A six-year-old green girl walks next to her father. The girl stands proud, confident, while her father seems weary from a hard day's work. The father knocks on the door of a little mud house. A young Quadling opens the door. He reluctantly beckons the girl and her father inside. The father rants on about how the Unnamed God is merciful and kind and blah, blah, blah. Then he turns to his little girl and shoves her forward. She is screaming and crying.
"NO! NO!"
But her father eventually manages to get the little girl calmed down. The girl takes a deep breath, closes her eyes, and begins to sing. Her voice is sweet, perfectly in tune, and as she sings, the Quadling can hear an orchestra playing behind her. The song is an old Unionist hymn. As soon as the girl finishes singing, she turns away and buries her face in her father's shirt.
"Never, never," she says. But her father ignores her. His daughter turns back around and watches her father continue to preach through solemn, knowing eyes.
Elphaba had to wipe her eyes again with the hem of her skirt as the memory overwhelmed her.