So I guess I just write Wicked fanfiction again now, which is fun. I already posted this over on ao3 but figured may as well pop it over here too. Thanks for reading!
The first time someone screams at the sight of her, really screams, Elphaba finally feels the reality of the situation come crashing down around her. This is not the inadvertent gasps or shrieks of laughter she has become accustomed to in a life filled with ostracism. This is the type of blood curdling scream borne of true terror, reserved for monsters, for nightmares and now, apparently, for her.
In that moment, she sees the truth of the future before her laid bare. In making her choices she hasn't just swept the pieces from the board, she's completely flipped the table. One decision made in a moment of pure rage, of pure defiance, and now there's no putting it back the way it was. Where once her future was an intricate web of branching possibilities, now it is distilled down into one bold, straight line hurtling her towards an inevitable conclusion.
She turns and flees from it then, unable to face what she's only just begun to realize. She leaves the frightened woman in the forest behind as she takes to the sky, hoping that this is just a fluke, an anomaly. She knows even then that it's not.
Her first hideout is not ideal in any sense. The small cave tucked into the Vinkun mountains is too open, too cramped, too indefensible. The location earns her the moniker Wicked Witch of the West, but once the name sticks they come looking for her. She abandons the cave and heads east, into the arms of a group of refugee Animals who are kind enough to take her in. She improves her survival skills bit by bit. She learns how to cover her tracks, how to become invisible in darkness. The future shelters she makes for herself are a fortress.
The first time she steals out of desperation is the first time she crosses a line she never imagined she'd cross. For all of her fiery temper and antagonistic nature, she's always been a rules follower, but some of the Animals have grown ill with winter settling over Oz and they are woefully lacking in medical supplies. She magically unlocks the apothecary door and slips inside under the cover of darkness. She feels a pang of regret in the knowledge that she is harming someone's livelihood even as she fills her bag with the necessary herbs and potions. If she had money to leave as compensation she would, but as it stands all she has is a silent apology.
The next time she crosses a line is the first time she deliberately uses her magic against another person. Sure, there had been accidents in the past, uncontrollable outbursts in times of extreme emotion, but those had never carried any sort of intent. This is different. She brings her wrath down upon the guards who threaten her Animal companions with a level of controlled focus she hadn't thought herself capable of. She feels the power course through her, readily available at her fingertips, sees the guards turn and flee as they realize they're badly outmatched. It's exhilarating. It's terrifying.
She hones her magic more as time goes on. She studies the Grimmerie with almost feverish determination, knowing that her survival may hinge on its mastery. They send more and more men after her, use tactics to try to smoke her out. She is always one step ahead of them, and when she isn't she finds that brute force is a fine substitute for evasion. They throw everything they have at her and she shakes it off and keeps moving. Her name grows in infamy, and she rises to the challenge.
The first time she truly fears for her life is that day in the throne room, staring down the barrel of Fiyero's gun. In those few, agonizing seconds before he turns and trains his weapon on the Wizard, Elphaba realizes that there's nothing she would do to try and stop him. If he had pulled the trigger then, she would have accepted it, but instead he takes her hand and they run.
That moment bleeds into an incalculable number of firsts with Fiyero, most of them found somewhere in a tangle of limbs and heated skin and desperate embraces. The first time she ever wants or feels wanted in this way. The first time she whispers I love you and means it. The first time she hears it whispered in return and believes it. She lies in his arms and looks up at the stars and thinks that, for the first time in a long time, there's something good in her life.
It doesn't last.
Glinda is there the first time that she truly and utterly gives up. After all of the pain, the anger, the loss, she has no choice but to surrender before it swallows her whole. Nessa, Doctor Dillamond, Fiyero. It's all too much, and the weight of her choices and her mistakes is already suffocating her. She reconciles with her best friend and stands ready to meet the oncoming witch hunters, to finally close this lamentable chapter of her life.
And yet even now, as she stands staring at the coming dawn, at the first chance for a fresh start she's had in as long as she can remember, she can't help but turn to glance behind. Things had been good here once, though it's getting harder and harder to recall it. Her first day at Shiz, her first party, her first real friendship. The memories rise to the surface like fragile rays of light to break through the darkness that's been clouding her, and her heart constricts to leave all of that behind even as she knows there's no separating it from what she's become.
So she turns and stares back over the land of Oz and takes a deep breath. For the life and the irreplaceable friend that she's leaving behind, for the promise of a brighter future before her.
For the last time.
And then there's just the slip of an emerald hand into a burlap glove, and the first step into beautiful uncertainty.