There's No Place like Home
Title: There's No Place like Home
Chapter One: Follow the Yellow Brick Road
Author: Co-written with blucougar57
Summary: Jack awakens to find himself in a strange land named Oz. With Gwen hot on his trail as the Wicked Witch of the West, will Jack ever find his way home?
Rating: T, for now.
Warnings: Contains Gwen-bashing. Don't like? Don't read. Crack!fic. Crossover with Doctor Who occasionally.
Follow the Yellow Brick Road
Colours. Bright, lurid colours, and sunlight that threatened to blind him through the glass of the SUV’s windshield. Those were the first things that registered in Jack Harkness’s mind as he slowly came back to awareness.
He blinked dazedly, struggling to overcome the sluggishness that tried to drag him back down into unconsciousness. As tempting as it was, he suspected it was high time that he woke up and tried to work out what had happened.
The last thing he remembered was driving through night-time Cardiff at an exceptionally high speed, anxious to get to Ianto and Gwen, who were apparently facing off against an alien of unknown origins. It was supposed to have been a simple diplomatic mission, but of course Gwen had royally fucked it up. He was going to be smacking himself up-side the head for the next week, trying to work out why he had thought it would be a good idea to send her.
Stupid, he thought sourly. It was just one more stupid idea in a long line of stupid ideas since that very first stupid idea that had resulted in him hiring the silly twit. If only he hadn’t messed up that dosage of retcon....
He blinked again, and finally looked beyond the tinted windshield glass, to his surroundings. And froze in disbelief and horror.
Outside there were at least three dozen tiny houses surrounded by unimaginable flowers and plants of all shapes, colours and sizes. Birds chirped sweetly in the warm sunlight as Jack finally decided to go outside the SUV and walk through the town.
Jack tried to take in everything as much as he could, but it was too amazing, too beautiful for even him to complain about. Everything seemed so at peace. The sky was a brilliant blue almost in harmony with the small green roofs of the tiny houses the filled the town.
“I have a feeling I’m not on Earth anymore,” Jack said to himself.
The alien plants spiralled up into the sky in such elegance. In the middle of the town was a dazzling blue lake filled with giant lily-pads and strange frogs with three eyes.
A sudden growl got Jack’s attention. He looked around in the direction it came from, but only a giant daffodil bush stood. Brushing it aside, Jack came to the conclusion that he was somewhere in the Rift. It was the only logical explanation.
At that moment, a strange humming sound filled the air, almost magical. Jack glanced up into the sky to see an overly large bubble floating in his direction. Disturbed, he slowly began to back away, thinking that the bubble might attack him. Instead, it hovered a few feet in front of him and slowly got bigger and brighter until finally fading to reveal the voluptuous figure of Donna.
“Donna!?” Jack said, stunned, as he gaped at her. She was dressed in a pink ball gown that clashed rather painfully with her ginger hair. In her hand was long staff with a large silver star attached to the end. Now he was positive he was dreaming.
“Yes, it is I. Donna, Good Witch of the North,” she replied musically.
“Yeah, right,” Jack muttered to himself, still not believing what he was seeing.
Donna overheard him and was clearly not amused, but let it pass. That time.
“Are you a good witch, or a bad witch?” Donna asked ever so politely.
Jack gave her a strange look.
“Do I look like a witch to you?” he asked incredulously. “I mean, come on! Look at this face! Does this look like the face of an ugly witch to you?”
“Oi! No need to get mouthy with me, you dumbo!”
She slammed the bottom of her staff into Jack’s foot, causing him to bellow in pain.
“That hurt,” he whined, hopping up and down while he clutched at his injured foot.
“Good, it was meant to. Now answer the question. And no smart business, I’m on a schedule here,” Donna pointed out.
“No, I’m neither,” Jack grumped, although he couldn’t help but notice the hint of a smile on Donna’s face.
“Well, that’s strange. Because the Weevils told me a new witch just dropped an SUV on the Wicked Witch of the East. There’s the SUV,” she said pointing to it on the other side of the lake, “and here you are, and that’s all that’s left of the Wicked Witch of the East.”
Jack turned to look where she was pointing, and yelped again in a very unmanly manner. Squashed below the tyres of the SUV were the somewhat gruesome remains of what Jack thought was rather ugly man in a long, black witch’s dress. He couldn’t see much, but his imagination more than made up for what he couldn’t see. What was clearly visible, though, was the one arm sticking out from beneath the half-crumpled vehicle, and clutched in the hand was just about the cutest little soft toy that Jack had ever seen.
“Uh... What’s that?” he asked tentatively.
“That is the witch’s muse,” Donna informed him. “It is with that magical toy that the witch devised many of his most wicked and nefarious plots...”
“Nefarious?” Jack echoed, only to yelp again when she whacked him over the head with her wand.
“Shut up, fly boy. I’m talking here.”
Jack grimaced and rubbed his head gingerly, but wisely kept his yap shut. Satisfied that he’d finally gotten the hint, Donna continued with her explanation.
“As I was saying, that is the Witch of the East’s magical muse. Now that the witch is dead, the muse no longer holds any power in this land, and its people have finally been freed from slavery. Come, Jack. They’d like to meet you.”
Trepidation on his face, Jack followed Donna down a few steps onto an area that wasn’t unlike the Plass back home. If you ignored the fact that there was no water tower sculpture, no paving stone with a perception filter, and that he was surrounded by luridly bright colours, overly large flora and the fauna...
Jack shrieked like a little girl, and hid behind Donna as weevils in their multitude emerged into sight from all manner of hiding places. Weevils that were wearing brightly coloured overalls...?
He poked his head out from behind Donna’s overly frilly dress, only to try and hide again as one of the weevils crept forward. His efforts to stay hidden were stymied, though, when Donna suddenly grabbed him by the ear and dragged him around into full view.
“Ouch!” Jack whined. “Ow ow ow!”
“Quit behaving like a bloody big baby,” Donna snapped, “and pay attention!”
Cringing, Jack rubbed at his ear and nervously faced the approaching creature.
“We thank you so much for releasing us from the power of the horrible Witch of the East,” the weevil spoke in a voice that was almost too growly to understand. “Who knows who else might have died if the Witch’s reign of terror had continued?”
“And for doing it so neatly as well,” spoke another weevil sarcastically.
Raising her staff up into the sky, Donna finally gave the signal for the news to be spread.
“Let the joyous news be spread, the Wicked old Witch at last is dead!”
With that, all the Weevils cheered together, finally being free of the notorious Witch. Placing Jack on a giant dragonfly, they began to parade around the city in song.
“Ding, Dong the Witch is dead. Which old Witch? The Wicked Witch! Ding, Dong the Wicked Witch is dead!“
After that, Jack tuned out. This was seriously starting to freak him out. Then again, who wouldn’t freak out seeing a whole lot of weevils sing and dance? Well, anyone except Gwen, of course.
Hopping off the weird alien dragonfly at the behest of the weevils, Jack reluctantly allowed himself to be led over to the town hall. Following him were hundreds of weevils, all smiling and baring disturbingly sharp teeth. He stopped dead, though, as he approached the entrance of the town hall.
Emerging through the arched doors, much to Jack’s confusion, was Martha. No way, it couldn’t be, he thought. Taking a closer look, he quickly came to the conclusion that he wasn’t dreaming at all. He was, he decided, completely delusional, and most likely severely concussed. Martha Jones had shrunk to four feet tall.
Standing right in front of Jack, she began to thank him.
“As Mayor of the Weevil City, and in the county of the land of OZ, I welcome you with great honour and respect.”
“Uh... Thank you... I think... But there’s something that’s confusing me,” Jack stammered. Yeah, he thought wryly. That’s the biggest understatement of my life, and that’s saying a hell of a lot.
“Yes?” Martha said, but Jack was trying his best to contain himself at the sight of miniaturized Martha. Thankfully... or maybe not so thankfully... one of the weevils found its way through the crowd with blood all over its face.
“I thoroughly... examined the Witch. And I can officially pronounce the witch dead,”
Jack raised his eyebrows at the weevil.
“You ate the Witch didn’t you?”
“Your point? I was doing the world a favour, okay?”
Jack backed off, hands raised defensively, when the weevil started growling at him. Stepping aside, Jack let Martha passed him as she stood at the bottom of the town halls steps.
“This is a day of Independence,” Martha begun to speak to all the weevils, “For all the weevils and their descendants. Now let it be said, the wicked old witch at last is dead!”
With that, the weevils all broke out into happiness once more at finally being free of the monster that had caused their lives - and many others - to be such a misery.
The Weevils danced in the streets and sung their hearts out, which caused Jack’s eardrums to almost burst. They weren’t the best singers in the universe, but also, not the worst either.
Slowly navigating himself through the weevils, Jack finally got back to Donna when all of a sudden a flash of red smoke erupted from somewhere in the middle of the weevils. From the smoke stood the thing that had haunted Jack’s nightmares for oh, so long. It was Gwen.
Cackling like the Witch that he’d always suspected her to be, the weevils fled in fear in terror. Then again, he supposed, who wouldn’t?
Her clothing suited her personality; a dark black cloak with a black pointed witch’s hat. Jack only barely prevented himself from exploding with hysterical laughter, though, when he saw her hideous green face. But when he thought of it, it was actually an improvement on her normal appearance.
Stalking her way around the town square, Gwen’s eyes finally caught the sight of Jack’s SUV. And what lay squashed and partially eaten underneath.
“I thought you said I killed the Witch?” Jack panicked trying to keep his voice low.
“You did, but that’s the Wicked Witch of the West. And she’s worse than the other one,” Donna said, not impressed with Jack’s stupidity.
Taking one glance at the crumpled arm, Gwen turned around to where Jack and Donna were standing.
“How dare you kill the Witch of the East! Do you not understand, if it wasn’t for him, I wouldn’t be who I am today,” Gwen snarled, her face going a dark green, and filling with evil hatred.
Jack couldn’t help himself. He allowed himself the leisure of a classic Ianto eye-roll.
Typical, even in a foreign alien land, surrounded by weevils and with a dead body, all Gwen could think about was herself.
“It was an accident. It’s not like I wanted to get sucked up by the rift, land here, to have to put up you whinging. I have much better things to do with my time.” Turning to Donna, Jack quietly whispered in her ear. “Look, do you know where I can get some coffee around here?”
He yelped yet again as he was once again clobbered over the head by Donna’s staff.
“You’ve got one of the worst enemies from Oz staring you in the face, and all you can think about is coffee?” Donna gave Jack a wide eyed look clearly not impressed.
Gwen stormed directly over to Jack. Since she was Gwen, naturally she had a very special and unique bond with Jack, so there was no need to go off-topic. Instead, she got straight to the point.
“Now listen to me, my pretty, you’re not the only one that can cause accidents. I have very special and magical powers that you cannot begin to understand,” Gwen cackled again, but this time with a pig snort added in for Jack’s amusement.
“Aren’t you forgetting the magical muse?” Donna asked politely with a grin.
“Of course. How could I forget,” Gwen turned around and strode back to the SUV, making sure that each hag-step she took was exactly one second apart. As she reached down to collect the soft toy, though, it vanished, and the arm curled up grotesquely under the car to disappear forever.
With one giant gasp, Gwen collapsed to her knees as she began to crawl under the SUV to find the toy, to only get a sudden stream of oil in her face.
“Jack! Don’t just stand there. Do something!” Gwen pleaded as her head slammed up on the underside of the SUV.
He didn’t move an inch.
Collecting her strength, Gwen finally managed to escape, but she was thoroughly now pissed. It was a state that never failed to amuse Jack.
“It’s gone! Where did you put it? Give it back to me now or I’ll...”
Donna cut her off unconcernedly.
“Well, if you weren’t a blinkered, repulsive old bat, you would have noticed that Jack has it in his hands,” Donna sniped back.
Looking down, Jack gaped in shock as he realised she was telling the truth. Somehow, the extremely cute stuffed toy had managed to appear in Jack’s hands. Giving it a squeeze, Jack pressed it up close to his chest and started making adorable baby noises to it.
“Give it back to me, now!” Gwen demanded again.
Jack ignored her and continued playing with his new stuffed toy. He finally decided to name it Coco; it was Jack’s second favourite thing after Ianto’s coffee.
Gwen tried again, and used her best seductive charm on the Captain.
“Jack, sweetheart, give me the nice toy, and then you can have me all to yourself, just like you’ve always wanted!”
Jack just gave her a smug look, and said only one thing.
“Mine.”
“That’s the way!” Donna said, giving Jack an approving nudge. “Now be gone, cauldron head, you have no power here. Away with you, foul beast.”
Gwen ripped at her hair and gave an annoyed fan girl-like squeal.
“Fine, but I’m warning you,” she snarled, getting right in Jack’s face. “I’ll get you, my pretty, and your little toy, too.”
Jack gagged, and pinched his nose with his fingers in disgust.
“No offence, but have you heard of a breath mint?”
Gwen ignored Jack and elegantly turning around, she caught her foot on her cloak and tripped over, landing face first into the stone pavement. Getting up with as much dignity as she could muster, Gwen stood up and disappeared in a burst of flames.
All the weevils emerged slowly from their hiding place, whilst others picked themselves up off the ground.
“The smell of sulphur, it reminds me of Pompeii,” Donna looked down to the ground, saddened. Jack placed a hand on her shoulder and gave her a reassuring smile.
“The sooner you get out of Oz the better, and the safer you’ll be,” Donna told him, now feeling a bit better.
“I’d do anything to get out of this place,” Jack answered without hesitation. “Which is the way back to Cardiff? I guess I can’t get back the way I came.”
Donna thought for a minute before answering excitedly. Jack could have sworn he could almost see the light bulb go on over her head.
“The one person who could get you back home is the great and wonderful Wizard of Oz himself. Mysterious, yes. Weird, definitely. But helpful, almost certainly.”
“Great,” Jack seemed pleased. “Where can I find this Wizard?”
“In the Emerald City,” Donna said pointing way over the horizon. Jack tried to follow her line of sight, but he could see nothing but a tiny peak in the distance. “Now whatever you do, do not let magical muse out of your sight, or the wicked witch will show no mercy to you.”
Jack grimaced. Of that he had no doubt whatsoever.
“One problem... How do I get there?” Jack asked.
“It’s always best to start at the beginning I suppose. So what you need to do is follow the yellow brick road.” Donna pointed out the yellow brick spiral that began only meters away from them.
The weevils watched and stared as Jack moved to the start of the yellow brick road, which was almost hypnotic. A thought just hit Jack.
“What happens if I get lost?”
Donna just rolled her eyes. “I told you, just follow the yellow brick road, you dumbo!”
And with that, a light began to surround Donna in the shape of a bubble. In seconds, she was floating away into the distance.
“Great, this is just what I needed. No coffee, Gwen on my trail, and I’m stuck in the middle of Weevil Central trying to find the wonderful Wizard of Oz.” Jack complained to himself.
Taking Donna’s last words into account, Jack turned back to the yellow brick road.
“Follow the yellow brick road...” he thought over in his head again and again as he began to walk.
Martha stopped right in front of him and repeated what he already knew.
“Follow the yellow brick road.”
He had only managed to get a few more steps ahead when one of the weevils stopped him and said the same thing again.
“Follow the yellow brick road.”
Another step and another stupid Weevil with it.
“Follow...”
“I get the point!!”
Jack was irritated now. Thankfully, they were quick learners, and backed off to leave him to follow the road without interruption.
Jack went round and round the spiral as the weevils began chanting the same damn thing. Because running was clearly out of the question, Jack began to skip, Coco dangling merrily by one of its arms in his hand.
Finally leaving the Weevil’s City’s boundaries, Jack skipped off into the distance with Coco in hand, off to see the Wizard and hopefully get back home to his own personal and familiar brand of weird.
To be continued...
Chapter One: Follow the Yellow Brick Road
Author: Co-written with blucougar57
Summary: Jack awakens to find himself in a strange land named Oz. With Gwen hot on his trail as the Wicked Witch of the West, will Jack ever find his way home?
Rating: T, for now.
Warnings: Contains Gwen-bashing. Don't like? Don't read. Crack!fic. Crossover with Doctor Who occasionally.
Follow the Yellow Brick Road
Colours. Bright, lurid colours, and sunlight that threatened to blind him through the glass of the SUV’s windshield. Those were the first things that registered in Jack Harkness’s mind as he slowly came back to awareness.
He blinked dazedly, struggling to overcome the sluggishness that tried to drag him back down into unconsciousness. As tempting as it was, he suspected it was high time that he woke up and tried to work out what had happened.
The last thing he remembered was driving through night-time Cardiff at an exceptionally high speed, anxious to get to Ianto and Gwen, who were apparently facing off against an alien of unknown origins. It was supposed to have been a simple diplomatic mission, but of course Gwen had royally fucked it up. He was going to be smacking himself up-side the head for the next week, trying to work out why he had thought it would be a good idea to send her.
Stupid, he thought sourly. It was just one more stupid idea in a long line of stupid ideas since that very first stupid idea that had resulted in him hiring the silly twit. If only he hadn’t messed up that dosage of retcon....
He blinked again, and finally looked beyond the tinted windshield glass, to his surroundings. And froze in disbelief and horror.
Outside there were at least three dozen tiny houses surrounded by unimaginable flowers and plants of all shapes, colours and sizes. Birds chirped sweetly in the warm sunlight as Jack finally decided to go outside the SUV and walk through the town.
Jack tried to take in everything as much as he could, but it was too amazing, too beautiful for even him to complain about. Everything seemed so at peace. The sky was a brilliant blue almost in harmony with the small green roofs of the tiny houses the filled the town.
“I have a feeling I’m not on Earth anymore,” Jack said to himself.
The alien plants spiralled up into the sky in such elegance. In the middle of the town was a dazzling blue lake filled with giant lily-pads and strange frogs with three eyes.
A sudden growl got Jack’s attention. He looked around in the direction it came from, but only a giant daffodil bush stood. Brushing it aside, Jack came to the conclusion that he was somewhere in the Rift. It was the only logical explanation.
At that moment, a strange humming sound filled the air, almost magical. Jack glanced up into the sky to see an overly large bubble floating in his direction. Disturbed, he slowly began to back away, thinking that the bubble might attack him. Instead, it hovered a few feet in front of him and slowly got bigger and brighter until finally fading to reveal the voluptuous figure of Donna.
“Donna!?” Jack said, stunned, as he gaped at her. She was dressed in a pink ball gown that clashed rather painfully with her ginger hair. In her hand was long staff with a large silver star attached to the end. Now he was positive he was dreaming.
“Yes, it is I. Donna, Good Witch of the North,” she replied musically.
“Yeah, right,” Jack muttered to himself, still not believing what he was seeing.
Donna overheard him and was clearly not amused, but let it pass. That time.
“Are you a good witch, or a bad witch?” Donna asked ever so politely.
Jack gave her a strange look.
“Do I look like a witch to you?” he asked incredulously. “I mean, come on! Look at this face! Does this look like the face of an ugly witch to you?”
“Oi! No need to get mouthy with me, you dumbo!”
She slammed the bottom of her staff into Jack’s foot, causing him to bellow in pain.
“That hurt,” he whined, hopping up and down while he clutched at his injured foot.
“Good, it was meant to. Now answer the question. And no smart business, I’m on a schedule here,” Donna pointed out.
“No, I’m neither,” Jack grumped, although he couldn’t help but notice the hint of a smile on Donna’s face.
“Well, that’s strange. Because the Weevils told me a new witch just dropped an SUV on the Wicked Witch of the East. There’s the SUV,” she said pointing to it on the other side of the lake, “and here you are, and that’s all that’s left of the Wicked Witch of the East.”
Jack turned to look where she was pointing, and yelped again in a very unmanly manner. Squashed below the tyres of the SUV were the somewhat gruesome remains of what Jack thought was rather ugly man in a long, black witch’s dress. He couldn’t see much, but his imagination more than made up for what he couldn’t see. What was clearly visible, though, was the one arm sticking out from beneath the half-crumpled vehicle, and clutched in the hand was just about the cutest little soft toy that Jack had ever seen.
“Uh... What’s that?” he asked tentatively.
“That is the witch’s muse,” Donna informed him. “It is with that magical toy that the witch devised many of his most wicked and nefarious plots...”
“Nefarious?” Jack echoed, only to yelp again when she whacked him over the head with her wand.
“Shut up, fly boy. I’m talking here.”
Jack grimaced and rubbed his head gingerly, but wisely kept his yap shut. Satisfied that he’d finally gotten the hint, Donna continued with her explanation.
“As I was saying, that is the Witch of the East’s magical muse. Now that the witch is dead, the muse no longer holds any power in this land, and its people have finally been freed from slavery. Come, Jack. They’d like to meet you.”
Trepidation on his face, Jack followed Donna down a few steps onto an area that wasn’t unlike the Plass back home. If you ignored the fact that there was no water tower sculpture, no paving stone with a perception filter, and that he was surrounded by luridly bright colours, overly large flora and the fauna...
Jack shrieked like a little girl, and hid behind Donna as weevils in their multitude emerged into sight from all manner of hiding places. Weevils that were wearing brightly coloured overalls...?
He poked his head out from behind Donna’s overly frilly dress, only to try and hide again as one of the weevils crept forward. His efforts to stay hidden were stymied, though, when Donna suddenly grabbed him by the ear and dragged him around into full view.
“Ouch!” Jack whined. “Ow ow ow!”
“Quit behaving like a bloody big baby,” Donna snapped, “and pay attention!”
Cringing, Jack rubbed at his ear and nervously faced the approaching creature.
“We thank you so much for releasing us from the power of the horrible Witch of the East,” the weevil spoke in a voice that was almost too growly to understand. “Who knows who else might have died if the Witch’s reign of terror had continued?”
“And for doing it so neatly as well,” spoke another weevil sarcastically.
Raising her staff up into the sky, Donna finally gave the signal for the news to be spread.
“Let the joyous news be spread, the Wicked old Witch at last is dead!”
With that, all the Weevils cheered together, finally being free of the notorious Witch. Placing Jack on a giant dragonfly, they began to parade around the city in song.
“Ding, Dong the Witch is dead. Which old Witch? The Wicked Witch! Ding, Dong the Wicked Witch is dead!“
After that, Jack tuned out. This was seriously starting to freak him out. Then again, who wouldn’t freak out seeing a whole lot of weevils sing and dance? Well, anyone except Gwen, of course.
Hopping off the weird alien dragonfly at the behest of the weevils, Jack reluctantly allowed himself to be led over to the town hall. Following him were hundreds of weevils, all smiling and baring disturbingly sharp teeth. He stopped dead, though, as he approached the entrance of the town hall.
Emerging through the arched doors, much to Jack’s confusion, was Martha. No way, it couldn’t be, he thought. Taking a closer look, he quickly came to the conclusion that he wasn’t dreaming at all. He was, he decided, completely delusional, and most likely severely concussed. Martha Jones had shrunk to four feet tall.
Standing right in front of Jack, she began to thank him.
“As Mayor of the Weevil City, and in the county of the land of OZ, I welcome you with great honour and respect.”
“Uh... Thank you... I think... But there’s something that’s confusing me,” Jack stammered. Yeah, he thought wryly. That’s the biggest understatement of my life, and that’s saying a hell of a lot.
“Yes?” Martha said, but Jack was trying his best to contain himself at the sight of miniaturized Martha. Thankfully... or maybe not so thankfully... one of the weevils found its way through the crowd with blood all over its face.
“I thoroughly... examined the Witch. And I can officially pronounce the witch dead,”
Jack raised his eyebrows at the weevil.
“You ate the Witch didn’t you?”
“Your point? I was doing the world a favour, okay?”
Jack backed off, hands raised defensively, when the weevil started growling at him. Stepping aside, Jack let Martha passed him as she stood at the bottom of the town halls steps.
“This is a day of Independence,” Martha begun to speak to all the weevils, “For all the weevils and their descendants. Now let it be said, the wicked old witch at last is dead!”
With that, the weevils all broke out into happiness once more at finally being free of the monster that had caused their lives - and many others - to be such a misery.
The Weevils danced in the streets and sung their hearts out, which caused Jack’s eardrums to almost burst. They weren’t the best singers in the universe, but also, not the worst either.
Slowly navigating himself through the weevils, Jack finally got back to Donna when all of a sudden a flash of red smoke erupted from somewhere in the middle of the weevils. From the smoke stood the thing that had haunted Jack’s nightmares for oh, so long. It was Gwen.
Cackling like the Witch that he’d always suspected her to be, the weevils fled in fear in terror. Then again, he supposed, who wouldn’t?
Her clothing suited her personality; a dark black cloak with a black pointed witch’s hat. Jack only barely prevented himself from exploding with hysterical laughter, though, when he saw her hideous green face. But when he thought of it, it was actually an improvement on her normal appearance.
Stalking her way around the town square, Gwen’s eyes finally caught the sight of Jack’s SUV. And what lay squashed and partially eaten underneath.
“I thought you said I killed the Witch?” Jack panicked trying to keep his voice low.
“You did, but that’s the Wicked Witch of the West. And she’s worse than the other one,” Donna said, not impressed with Jack’s stupidity.
Taking one glance at the crumpled arm, Gwen turned around to where Jack and Donna were standing.
“How dare you kill the Witch of the East! Do you not understand, if it wasn’t for him, I wouldn’t be who I am today,” Gwen snarled, her face going a dark green, and filling with evil hatred.
Jack couldn’t help himself. He allowed himself the leisure of a classic Ianto eye-roll.
Typical, even in a foreign alien land, surrounded by weevils and with a dead body, all Gwen could think about was herself.
“It was an accident. It’s not like I wanted to get sucked up by the rift, land here, to have to put up you whinging. I have much better things to do with my time.” Turning to Donna, Jack quietly whispered in her ear. “Look, do you know where I can get some coffee around here?”
He yelped yet again as he was once again clobbered over the head by Donna’s staff.
“You’ve got one of the worst enemies from Oz staring you in the face, and all you can think about is coffee?” Donna gave Jack a wide eyed look clearly not impressed.
Gwen stormed directly over to Jack. Since she was Gwen, naturally she had a very special and unique bond with Jack, so there was no need to go off-topic. Instead, she got straight to the point.
“Now listen to me, my pretty, you’re not the only one that can cause accidents. I have very special and magical powers that you cannot begin to understand,” Gwen cackled again, but this time with a pig snort added in for Jack’s amusement.
“Aren’t you forgetting the magical muse?” Donna asked politely with a grin.
“Of course. How could I forget,” Gwen turned around and strode back to the SUV, making sure that each hag-step she took was exactly one second apart. As she reached down to collect the soft toy, though, it vanished, and the arm curled up grotesquely under the car to disappear forever.
With one giant gasp, Gwen collapsed to her knees as she began to crawl under the SUV to find the toy, to only get a sudden stream of oil in her face.
“Jack! Don’t just stand there. Do something!” Gwen pleaded as her head slammed up on the underside of the SUV.
He didn’t move an inch.
Collecting her strength, Gwen finally managed to escape, but she was thoroughly now pissed. It was a state that never failed to amuse Jack.
“It’s gone! Where did you put it? Give it back to me now or I’ll...”
Donna cut her off unconcernedly.
“Well, if you weren’t a blinkered, repulsive old bat, you would have noticed that Jack has it in his hands,” Donna sniped back.
Looking down, Jack gaped in shock as he realised she was telling the truth. Somehow, the extremely cute stuffed toy had managed to appear in Jack’s hands. Giving it a squeeze, Jack pressed it up close to his chest and started making adorable baby noises to it.
“Give it back to me, now!” Gwen demanded again.
Jack ignored her and continued playing with his new stuffed toy. He finally decided to name it Coco; it was Jack’s second favourite thing after Ianto’s coffee.
Gwen tried again, and used her best seductive charm on the Captain.
“Jack, sweetheart, give me the nice toy, and then you can have me all to yourself, just like you’ve always wanted!”
Jack just gave her a smug look, and said only one thing.
“Mine.”
“That’s the way!” Donna said, giving Jack an approving nudge. “Now be gone, cauldron head, you have no power here. Away with you, foul beast.”
Gwen ripped at her hair and gave an annoyed fan girl-like squeal.
“Fine, but I’m warning you,” she snarled, getting right in Jack’s face. “I’ll get you, my pretty, and your little toy, too.”
Jack gagged, and pinched his nose with his fingers in disgust.
“No offence, but have you heard of a breath mint?”
Gwen ignored Jack and elegantly turning around, she caught her foot on her cloak and tripped over, landing face first into the stone pavement. Getting up with as much dignity as she could muster, Gwen stood up and disappeared in a burst of flames.
All the weevils emerged slowly from their hiding place, whilst others picked themselves up off the ground.
“The smell of sulphur, it reminds me of Pompeii,” Donna looked down to the ground, saddened. Jack placed a hand on her shoulder and gave her a reassuring smile.
“The sooner you get out of Oz the better, and the safer you’ll be,” Donna told him, now feeling a bit better.
“I’d do anything to get out of this place,” Jack answered without hesitation. “Which is the way back to Cardiff? I guess I can’t get back the way I came.”
Donna thought for a minute before answering excitedly. Jack could have sworn he could almost see the light bulb go on over her head.
“The one person who could get you back home is the great and wonderful Wizard of Oz himself. Mysterious, yes. Weird, definitely. But helpful, almost certainly.”
“Great,” Jack seemed pleased. “Where can I find this Wizard?”
“In the Emerald City,” Donna said pointing way over the horizon. Jack tried to follow her line of sight, but he could see nothing but a tiny peak in the distance. “Now whatever you do, do not let magical muse out of your sight, or the wicked witch will show no mercy to you.”
Jack grimaced. Of that he had no doubt whatsoever.
“One problem... How do I get there?” Jack asked.
“It’s always best to start at the beginning I suppose. So what you need to do is follow the yellow brick road.” Donna pointed out the yellow brick spiral that began only meters away from them.
The weevils watched and stared as Jack moved to the start of the yellow brick road, which was almost hypnotic. A thought just hit Jack.
“What happens if I get lost?”
Donna just rolled her eyes. “I told you, just follow the yellow brick road, you dumbo!”
And with that, a light began to surround Donna in the shape of a bubble. In seconds, she was floating away into the distance.
“Great, this is just what I needed. No coffee, Gwen on my trail, and I’m stuck in the middle of Weevil Central trying to find the wonderful Wizard of Oz.” Jack complained to himself.
Taking Donna’s last words into account, Jack turned back to the yellow brick road.
“Follow the yellow brick road...” he thought over in his head again and again as he began to walk.
Martha stopped right in front of him and repeated what he already knew.
“Follow the yellow brick road.”
He had only managed to get a few more steps ahead when one of the weevils stopped him and said the same thing again.
“Follow the yellow brick road.”
Another step and another stupid Weevil with it.
“Follow...”
“I get the point!!”
Jack was irritated now. Thankfully, they were quick learners, and backed off to leave him to follow the road without interruption.
Jack went round and round the spiral as the weevils began chanting the same damn thing. Because running was clearly out of the question, Jack began to skip, Coco dangling merrily by one of its arms in his hand.
Finally leaving the Weevil’s City’s boundaries, Jack skipped off into the distance with Coco in hand, off to see the Wizard and hopefully get back home to his own personal and familiar brand of weird.
To be continued...