Chapter Twelve:

 

"You reptile!" Margot was fussing at the Scarecrow. "You KNEW this was going to happen!"

The five companions were inching their way down a crooked path that led through the darkest heart of the haunted forest. All the close growing trees were black and twisted and somehow unhealthy looking, a hundred years worth of dead, rotting leaves littered their way, and various unidentified and deeply unsettling sounds issued from the profound shadows all around them.

Worse, it had taken them most of the day to come this far from the Emerald City, and they were losing the light. The thought of being caught in this rotting and sinister forest at nightfall had upset Barney to the point that he was shaking continually, and once he had even gripped the handle of the butterfly net he carried so hard that he'd bent the tough metal as though it were taffy.

Toto insisted on walking so close to Dorothy's feet that she had to watch her footing constantly to avoid tripping over him.

Margot, gripped by the same dread of being benighted in the haunted forest, had been taking her mind off her fear by bitching at the Scarecrow. It helped, a little, and besides, in her opinion, he richly deserved it.

"How would I know a thing like that, Margot?" the Scarecrow was arguing. "Do you think I'm 'omniscient' - like Oz claims to be?"

"Oh, yes, you did! You wanted to go after the Witch first, long before we ever got to the Emerald City! Didn't he, Dorothy? Back in the forest, where we met Barney? 'It's best to be preemptive', you said!"

"Well . . . you DID say that, you know," Dorothy agreed.

"I take it the two of you think it's NOT best to be preemptive, then? The Witch would like to kill us all. Perhaps you think we ought to just lie down and die right now, to save him the effort?"

"Don't change the subject!" Margot snapped. "You knew the Wizard would send us on this goddamn suicide mission, you knew it all along!"

"I didn't KNOW anything!" he retorted, hotly.  "I had an idea he might, considering that he never seems to actually do anything, and it's not such a vast mental leap to theorize that he does nothing for the simple reason that he can do nothing. He's been doing nothing about the Witch for years. Why do you think I finally did something? Any one of you might have had the same idea - IF you'd been paying attention"

He was clearly genuinely annoyed.

"You know, whenever there's a difficult question to consider, every last one of you just automatically stares at ME, as though it's somehow my job to figure everything out for you. But if things don't go the way you want, then it's because I planned it that way! I'm tired of it! It's not my fault that none of you take the trouble to think ahead!"

He stiffly turned his back on them and stalked off down the crooked path.

Margot felt an odd sense of accomplishment in having actually succeeded in getting his goat. It cheered her up and moved some of her fears back a step or two, enough to get control of them, at least. And once she got in control of herself, she was able to notice how badly terrified Barney was, and so she fell into step with him.

"Hey, Barney," she said to him. "Want to help me make up a song about hyenas? I've got the first verse, but I can't seem to think of a rhyme for 'revolting'. You've GOT to help me!"

For her part, Dorothy reminded herself that even a Scarecrow with a brilliant intellect and a murderous temperament and a skull full of wretched rubbish might not appreciate being taken for granted.  She picked up her pace and caught him up, then quickly took his arm before she could lose her nerve.

"Why the heck should we think ahead? That's what we've got YOU for! We're all a bit thick. You may have noticed," she told him. "Don't be mad, okay? Margot's just nervous. We all are."

"Hmmph," he snorted, not quite prepared to concede yet. Still, he did not attempt to take his arm back, so maybe he wasn't completely disgusted with her. "I don't suppose the Witch taught his famous flying pigs to eat any of YOU!"

"You never know," she replied. "The Witch might do any gross thing, from what I've seen. Can I ask you something? Why did you tell me to introduce myself? To the Wizard?"

"May I ask you something? I've been wondering about it. Aren't you sorry you came to Oz? I can hardly see how you would not be. Virtually everything that's happened to you since you got here has been either unpleasant, at the very least, or even absolutely awful, at times."

He stopped walking and turned to face her for a moment. Apparently her answer to this question was important to him. They stared at one another, arms linked, for what began to seem a long time.

"Not everything," she finally said, clearly.

"Are you sorry you came to Oz?" he repeated.

"No . . . no, I'm not."

"Why would . . . why not? Don't you think you should be?"

"Probably. . .  yeah, probably I should be. But I'm not. I don't really know why. Do you? After all, you're the smart one."

"Am I?"

"Sometimes. No, Scarecrow, in case you didn't hear me, I am NOT sorry I came to Oz."

He smiled. "Good. I'm not sorry either. That you came."

She laughed. "Well, I DID let you out of that cornfield."

"Much to everyone's dismay. Are you teasing ME, Special Agent Gale?"

"Could be. Is that a problem?"

"Not for me . . .”

"Tough guy, huh?"

"You'll have to draw your own conclusions. I have been known to tease back."

It was fun, Dorothy thought, to bat this ball back and forth like this. This was fun. And something more, as well. She was willing to admit that to herself, now, in this terrible place.

"I wonder if I can think of some way to get a straight answer out of you?" she asked, and moved a step or two closer. Just enough. He did not relinquish his ground, and, in fact, advanced a pace or two into hers.

"Do you have a plan?" he asked, red eyes boring into hers, sparking.

"Oh, I wouldn't call it a plan, exactly. More of a nonverbal gambit."

"Truly? An ingenious strategy. I am at your convenience. Do your worst. "

"Hmm. Or my best, I'm not really sure . . . hold still, now . . ." she moved very close indeed, close enough to determine that she and the straw man before her were very much of a height, and that there might be ways in which this could prove opportune . . .

And the pregnant moment might well have borne fruit, if only Barney and Margot, absorbed in the composition of their derogatory ditty about hyenas, had been watching where they were going, and had not walked right into Dorothy and the Scarecrow, cutting their dialogue short before it could progress into the nonverbal.

The quintet had to sort themselves out after the collision, and, Dorothy noticed, the Scarecrow reacted to the mishap with less than his usual unruffled grace, and was actually a bit surly, growling at Barney and Margot about watching where they were going until they both felt like idiots and had to apologize quite a few times.

Barney was the first to notice the signpost.

"Haunted Forest" it read. "Witch's Castle -1 MI"

And an addendum: "I'd turn back if I were you."

"Great!" Barney complained. "Even the mileage markers have editorial comments. We could all just do that, you know. "

"Turn back?" Margot asked. "Forget the whole thing? What about the Wizard? What about the Witch?"

"FUCK the Wizard," Barney replied. "Fuck the Witch too. Why are we even in this? Does anybody really think the Wizard is gonna help any of us even if we DO survive the Witch? Hell, Scarecrow, you said yourself that he's probably useless."

"I also said that the Witch will never let this drop. I said the Witch would like to kill us all. I said the Witch is in a perfect frenzy about that Ruby Brain and will walk through Dorothy to get it. Or any of us. So, if we're going to fuck someone, it is my considered opinion that it SHOULD BE THE WITCH! Are we clear on this yet? Am I going too fast for you, Barney?"

Barney was so startled to hear the refined Scarecrow exasperated enough to use profanity that he was more amused than offended.  He had to laugh.

"Well, when it comes to fucking the Witch, Scarecrow, I think you already pretty well wrote the definitive dissertation. But I do see your point."

 

Meanwhile, as Dorothy and her friends stood bickering in the haunted forest, one mile away in the Witch's castle, the Witch, Cordell, and the Senior Wing Commander of the Flying Pigs were staring into a new and elaborate elevated video monitor.

The new elmo had been purchased at great expense from an Oz pornography baron who sidelined in first rate video equipment and media electronics. Not only were the focus and image resolution on the new machine a hundred percent better than the old one, but it provided audio surveillance as well.

“. . . when it comes to fucking the Witch . . .” the small, clear image of Barney the Squeamish Lion was saying from the monitor.

The Witch lacked the facial resources to smile evilly, but he managed something darn close by gritting his fully exposed teeth and rolling his goggled eye. He was unaware that both Cordell and the Senior Pig hated it when he did that and sincerely wished he wouldn't do it anymore.

"We'll just SEE who fucks WHO!" the Witch sniped. "Or should that be 'whom'? Anyway, it doesn't matter. Are your people ready, Wing Commander Otis?"

"Ready, your Ickiness, sir!" Otis the Pig replied with a smart salute.

"Cordell, what about the monkey squadrons? You've got them briefed?"

Cordell nodded. He was able to speak in the Witch's language; was, in fact, quite proficient in it. But he preferred the rich and evocative nuances of his native monkey tongue, and rarely used what he considered the impoverished patois of the Oz humans if he could help it.

"Let's just go over the mission objectives one more time," the Witch said. "Number one - capture Dorothy Gale and that horrid little screaming lamb of hers. And make sure you collect any luggage or bags or whatever she has on her, too. She's armed, and she can fight, so be warned. She must be taken alive, and I don't care how many soldiers you have to lose to do it. The others don't really matter. I'd like to get that ever-fucking Scarecrow alive too, but that can wait -”

"Should me and some of the boys eat him, your Vileness?" Otis put in, hopefully.

"No . . . no. It's a pleasant thought, but at this point I'd rather see something like that in person. Just bring me that girl and her pet. The Scarecrow will fight you, I think he's got some kind of sick crush on her - and he fights like a goddamned buzz-saw. Leave him alive if you can, but do what you have to do to bring me the girl. Get in, get the girl, get out. That's the mission. All right? Any questions?"

"What about the other two? The Lion and your sister?"

"Same thing. I can deal with them later, when I have more time to be creative. For now, I just want Special Agent Gale. Alive. Got it?"

"Sir, yes sir!" Otis the pig rapped out. Cordell rolled his eyes. He privately thought these jarhead commando pigs were way too impressed with themselves for a bunch of artificially bred genetic mutations.

"Then FLY," cried the Witch, in his deep radio announcer baritone. "Fly, fly, fly, FLY!"

Wing Commander Otis marched to the open window of the Witch's chamber and stepped out onto the terrace. With a final salute, he took to the air.

Cordell and the Witch watched as he flew out to meet a squadron of his fellows and joined their formation at the head. Winged monkeys and flying pigs; the airborne armada of the Witch's malice. The sky was almost black with them.

The Witch returned his attention to the five figures on his elmo screen.

"Fuck ME, huh? That's the plan?" he muttered at the screen. "Well, let's just see who's well and truly fucked before this night is through . . ."   

 

Back at the haunted forest, Dorothy's companions were debating the issue of whether spooks did or did not exist in actual fact.

Dorothy was of the opinion that people who resided in an alternate reality where Wizards, Witches, flying pigs and living Scarecrows hardly raised an eyebrow were stretching a bit to cavil at a few spooks. But she had learned that her companions were never too busy for a good debate, so she stood by and pretty much tuned out as she waited for them to finish arguing.

Because she was not as absorbed in the controversy as the others, she was, once again, the first to notice that they had a problem.

It looked to her like a full scale air raid, like a scene from an old movie about the invasion of Pearl Harbor, perhaps. Except these aircraft appeared to be propelled more by the flapping of pinions than by prop engines. Even at a distance she could see that.

Just another day in Oz, she thought grimly, and set about arming herself.

"Guys - incoming - look up, toward the horizon, " she said to the others, loading her shotgun.

They all looked into the sky and saw the flocks and flocks of winged creatures the Witch had sent to meet them. Headed toward their position with frightening speed.

"Oh, God," Barney moaned. "I HATE this shit, I really do."

"Wow, there must be hundreds of' 'em. Pigs and monkeys both," Margot said. "This time we really may be toast. Can I borrow that gun again, Dorothy?"

The Scarecrow was already busy winding his bow and looking askance at the meager opportunities for cover the bleak twisted black trees offered. Dorothy felt there was something she had to say to him, even though she was already positive he'd never listen.

"He's sent the pigs. You need to hide - get to cover."

"What cover would that be, Dorothy?" he asked, wryly. "Point it out to me if you see it. We could use an advantage just now."

 

"You said it yourself - they're not trained to eat US. But they are trained to eat -”

"Oh, I wouldn't worry about that. Not with the Witch stuck in his castle a mile away from the action. He'd want a front row seat for such a unique spectacle, I expect," he paused to put a half dozen crossbow bolts in his breast pocket, and glanced at the approaching air armada.

"No, I think all this elaborate effort is meant for you. Oh, by the way, if you're captured, you're to stay alive. Understand?  I'll come get you.  If I'm not dead, of course. Other than that, our options are limited. There's no cover and there are too many of them." 

"I'll be really pissed if you're dead, I hope you know that. So what do we do now?"

He smiled, rather an ugly smile. "Stand. If we can."

"Yeah. Looks that way to me too. What do you think our chances are?"

"Honestly?"

"Sure."

"We're fucked."

"Oh. So . . . it's not as bad as I thought, then. Sure you're not being too optimistic?"

A grim moment passed, and then they both burst into gales of somewhat crazed laughter as they returned to their respective preparations for the hopeless battle just ahead.

Barney and Margot, who'd been working to devise a set of earplugs for the Lion so that he could wield a gun, stopped what they were doing and stared at the two as though lobsters had suddenly begun to crawl out of their noses.

"Have you noticed how much alike those two are?" Margot commented to Barney.

"Berserkers, both of them. Look at ‘em - they LOVE this kind of stuff. She's as bad as he is. It's actually kind of cute, in a really horrible way."

Dorothy came to Barney and put one of the .45's in his paws. "Barney," she said. "Here's the crash course: Pull this thing all the way back. Point this end at the enemy. Squeeze this thingy.  And repeat. See, just like using shampoo. You'll be fine. Margot, you help him with the clip, when he's dry. Here's some extras for you, here's the other gun. Good luck, guys. If I don't get a chance to tell you later, it's been fun."  

A few moments later, all last minute preparations were cut short as the first wave of the invading air force hit.

Dorothy's first impression was one of terrible noise. The beat of many wings, the awful screeching chattering of monkeys, the squealing and snorting of the fighting swine. She fired, and heard other gunshots, the familiar explosive blasts intertwining with all the rest of the tapestry of noise, and then the hissing of the crossbow, and then some of the pigs were squealing more in pain than in lusty battle cries, and she fired, and she heard the roaring of the Lion, who did not sound at all squeamish in that instant, and she knelt in the crackling dead leaves underfoot to reload, and a single piercing scream that sounded like Margot, and monkeys shrieking, and, suddenly, she heard, very close, too close, the whir of several sets of powerful wings just behind her.

She heard it a second too late. Before she could turn around, too many pairs of dark monkey hands gripped her shoulders, arms, and wrists, twisting the empty shotgun out of her grasp and lifting, lifting her up off the ground so that she could not use her feet or legs to kick or pull.

The beat of wings pushing against the initial pull of gravity, the downward rush of air over her face as she rose, twisting in the grip of her simian aerial abductors, until they'd carried her high enough to stop fighting, for fear of being dropped.

Below her, farther and farther, she could see her companions overrun by the soldiers of the Witch, and could see that they must be out of ammunition, because they were now fighting hand to hand, hopelessly outnumbered.

Then she saw something that went to her heart like a silver bullet. One of the larger monkeys had just scooped Toto up off the ground as the lamb dashed, terrified, across the crooked path. The winged monkey rose into the air with Toto squirming in its arms, and if ever there had been a time when Toto would have been perfectly justified in screaming, this was it.

Dorothy looked away from the shrinking scene below. She needed to think.

“. . . if you're captured, you're to stay alive . . .”

Last minute instructions it would probably be wise to focus on. Okay, Project Number One: stay alive, for however long I can.

" . . . I'll come get you . . .”

Very good. I'll be waiting. Better bring an army, and please don't be late, there may be a time factor. See Project Number One.

". . . if I'm not dead, of course . . .”

No need to add THAT. It's stating the obvious, for one thing, and it's too damned scary, for another, and it would break my stupid heart if you were, if you must know. If any of you were.

“. . . stay alive . . .”

Okay, it's a deal. I will if you will. What the hell, stranger things have happened. All day long, today, in fact.

And so, Dorothy Gale of Effbeeye newly focused in her mind and intent on her agenda, relaxed a minute fraction in the grip of her captors, and calmly awaited her imminent meeting with the Witch.