AN: I'm not even going to say anything in this AN. (Okay, I just did, but that's not the point.)
*goes into hiding*

15. Wherever You Are

Frexspar let Fiyero go the moment the lifeboat touched the water and the prince flew to the railing, trying to see Elphaba, but it was too dark for him to be able to distinguish her from the other passengers. He whirled around and ran across the deck, trying to find a lifeboat that he might still be able to get on, but there was none. They were all gone.

Nessarose came wheeling towards the governor, weeping. "Father, there was no lifeboat!" she cried. "There are no more boats – we're stuck here, Father… we're going to die!"

Frexspar looked white as a sheet as he tried to comfort his youngest daughter and Fiyero realised that this must have been Avaric's plan all along. He swore to himself that if he survived this somehow, he would strangle Avaric with his bare hands for what he had done to Elphaba and her family. He would.

Just then, however, Avaric came stumbling onto the deck and Fiyero stared at him. Frexspar did, too, not comprehending what was going on.

"It was that witch!" Avaric shouted, pointing at the water. His eyes were burning. "She threw me out of the boat! She threw me out of the lifeboat and back onto the ship!"

Fiyero felt a rush of affection and love for his green girl. At least she'd done that. He was happy to know that she was at least free now and he found himself hoping with all his heart that Avaric would not survive this whole ordeal.

The ship slowly filled with water. At some point, the entire ship snapped in half. One half disappeared underneath the water almost immediately; the other half, which Fiyero was on, remained afloat but slowly started to rise to a vertical angle. People slid down the deck, screaming as they lost their footing and plunged into the icy cold water beneath.

Fiyero was clinging to the railing somewhere on the side. At some point, as the deck rose steeper and steeper, something suddenly whooshed past him – something on wheels – with a loud, agonised scream. It took him a few moments to realise, to his utter horror, that it had been Nessarose in her chair. She slammed into the water and Fiyero thought he could hear Frexspar screaming her name, but he wasn't sure.

He lost his grip on the railing and fell down as well, skidding and slipping down the deck towards the water. The shock of the cold made it impossible for him to breathe for a moment, but then his survival instincts kicked in and he started swimming, trying to keep breathing, feeling his heart pounding in his chest. He shook the water out of his face and swam away from the ship. People were floating everywhere – most of them wearing life-jackets, like Fiyero himself; others had found something to hold onto – a floating piece of wood or even, in many cases, another passenger that had already died.

He felt a lump in his throat at the realisation that Nessarose was now somewhere in the sea below him, drowning as her chair sank lower and lower. He squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head in an attempt to clear it of the image. He did not want to think about that. So many people had already died and they were still dying, but he was not going to be one of them. He had a reason to live. The best reason, and he wasn't going to give up now that he had just found that reason.

He floated around in his life-jacket, taking slow, steady, deep breaths, and he pictured Elphaba. He pictured her in that scarlet dress she'd worn the last time he saw her, her emerald skin glowing, her dark brown eyes sparkling. He pictured her smile and he remembered the way she felt in his arms, the way she smelt, the way she kissed. He was going to survive. He had to. For her.

It felt like days, but in reality, it was only a matter of minutes before the ship sank completely, leaving the last passengers in the water as well. Some of them were still thrashing around, crying or calling out for help. Some were completely still – dead or unconscious, he wasn't sure. The air around him slowly quieted, more and more, the people's screams dying away as the life drained from their bodies.

He was gasping for breath now. It was so cold, and he felt so heavy… his eyes started closing, but he forced them to open again. If he closed his eyes now, he was never going to open them again.

But he was so tired and so cold – it was so incredibly cold…

His breath escaping his lips creating a visible cloud of fog in the night sky was the last thing he saw before his eyes fluttered shut and he sank into unconsciousness.

In the end, Elphaba Thropp made it to Shiz University after all.

The people in their lifeboat had been saved by the people on board another ship, after hours of floating around aimlessly. They had watched in horror as the ship they had been on snapped in two and slowly disappeared under the water – slowly, and then faster, faster, until it was gone completely.

The other people in the lifeboat had cried, screamed, and wept as they watched the ship go under. Elphaba had sat there, staring at the display, never taking her eyes off it, but feeling completely numb. She felt like she was screaming inside, but she could not voice what she was feeling in any way and so she stayed silent, not moving and not saying a word.

It wasn't until later, when they were just floating on the water, that the images of Nessarose, of her father, and of Fiyero suddenly filled her mind, and she started sobbing. One of the other women in the lifeboat put an arm around her and allowed the green girl to cry into her shoulder, rubbing her back and saying soothing things to her. Her sobs died away just as abruptly as they'd begun. No-one asked her anything and no-one said a word. Silence filled the air until it was almost deafening.

And then this other ship had approached them and they had been helped out of the water. They were all wrapped in thick, soft blankets and given hot soup. Their names were asked and written down and they were assigned a place to sleep. Elphaba thought she'd be unable to sleep after everything that had happened; but despite her raging mind, the emotions of the night had worn her out completely and she fell asleep the moment her head hit a pillow. She slept restlessly, though, plagued by nightmares and dreams and visions, images of dead bodies and sinking ships alternating with memories of her father's face and Nessa's smile and Fiyero's touch. It was too much, but she could not stop it and she awoke feeling even more tired than she had before.

They had been brought to Gillikin, but everything had passed in a blur for Elphaba. She had been lost, not knowing what to do or where to go. She'd wandered the streets for a few days, returning to the small camp that had been set up for the disaster survivors every night to sleep there, but escaping that place again every morning, unable to even look at the faces of all those people who had experienced the same thing she had, who had lost loved ones, too. She could not bear it.

It was one day when she put her cold hands into the pockets of her donated coat to warm them up that she found the solution in the shape of the hair clasp Avaric had given her. She had discovered it still in her hair after she had been rescued and she had slipped it into the pocket of her coat; but now she looked at it, really studied it, turning it around in her hands, and she realised that she had had the answer to everything with her all along.

That same day, she sold the hair clasp for a lot of money and applied for Shiz University, to which she was accepted a week later. She was assigned a dorm room and given her timetable, she bought the books and some other necessities she had not had for a while – like fresh clothes and a hairbrush – and settled in, trying to pay no mind to the hollow feeling in her heart that seemed to demand her attention all the time.

She had informed, of course, after her family and Fiyero. She'd asked about Boq and Galinda, too. However, it was explained to her that no information could be given to her on anyone who was not a family member; and so she could not find out anything at all about Boq, Galinda, or Fiyero. A woman had told her that she had heard that the crown prince of the Vinkus was still missing, but she had quickly added that news from the Vinkus usually travelled very slowly and so she had no idea what was going on with the prince at the present time.

When she had inquired about Nessarose and her father, she had been told that Frexspar's name was in the register of people who had perished that fatal day. Nessarose's was, too; her body had not been found, but some people who'd been in the lifeboats had seen her chair falling down into the water. Given the fact that she was always strapped in her chair, it was assumed that she had been pulled under by the heavy thing and had drowned. Frex and Nessa were both gone.

She had spent the rest of that afternoon in the park near Shiz, finding herself a private spot where she could cry her heart out without anyone seeing her. She'd apologised, even though they could not hear her, for not being a better sister, or a better daughter; for defying her father so many times and for crippling Nessarose; for not being what they had always wanted her to be.

At night, she talked to Fiyero. She told him about everything that was happening; everything she was thinking, everything she was feeling. She told him about Shiz and how happy she was to be here, but also about the emptiness inside of her and how much she missed him. She told him about her guilt concerning his and her family's deaths and she admitted to him that she did not in the least regret condemning Avaric to death by throwing him back onto that ship. Avaric had died, too, she had found out. The Tenmeadows estate was not too far away from Shiz and all of Gillikin was talking about the death of the margrave of Tenmeadows.

Elphaba felt a grim satisfaction at that, which only made her feel more guilty. When had she turned into the kind of person that felt good about other people dying?

The day I lost everything I loved, she realised then, and she stopped caring. There was nothing she could do about it now, anyway. Avaric was gone. So was her family. So was Fiyero. She was just going to have to accept that and deal with it.

She knew she was the governor of Munchkinland now and that the house, the money, everything that had once belonged to Frexspar, was now hers. A letter from Munchkinland had reached her, informing her that a temporary governor had been installed until Elphaba would return. She had sent a letter of her own, saying that she would most likely not return to Munchkinland for another three years, since she would be attending Shiz University and did not plan on returning home until she finished her education. She could go home for Lurlinemas break or summer vacation, of course, but she did not want to. Not yet. She didn't think she could do that – going back and not finding her father or her sister there.

She did not even return to Munchkinland for their funerals – Nessa's coffin would be empty, anyway, and her father… she didn't think he would have wanted her on his funeral. Her not attending it would both be respecting his feelings and protecting her own heart – or what was left of it, anyway.

She wasn't happy. She didn't think she would ever be able to be happy again. But she was holding on, and for now, that was all that mattered.