Exodus 2/2 (Wicked)
Title: Exodus 2/?
Fandom: Book
Characters: General Cast
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Implied non-con, captivity, physical abuse.
Summary: Based off of the Gregory Maguire Wicked Years, AU. The Philosophy Club is everything it's rumored to be; disgusting and filthy with unspeakable acts happening in every corner. What Fiyero Tigelaar didn't expect was to find an enchanting emerald woman locked away in the basement, a slave to the club's mysterious owners. Warnings for non-con, captivity, physical abuse, and language.
Fiyero lurched forward at the sharp pain against the back of his head. He reached up with a slight scowl to rub the spot before turning to Avaric, “That was for-“
“Not being here, of course,” his companion replied with a smirk, “you’re gone. Again.”
“I’m right here as I have always been.”
Avaric shook his head, “We left you outside the Philosophy Club. You’re worse than Tibbett with the Ti-“
Tibbett slammed his hand down on the table to interrupt Avaric, “I told you to stop talking about that. It was the club. It was something in the drink. It was not me, I’m telling you.”
Avaric only laughed in response, “I hear you’re a real Animal in the sack.”
Tibbett’s face turned a furious shade of red, rivaling the deep ochre of Fiyero’s skin tone, “Drop it.”
Sensing another fight brewing on the subject, Fiyero interjected, “They don’t really have the most unspeakable evil there.”
“I think if you ask our friend Tibbett, he’d disagree.”
“Avaric! Forget it happened!”
“I want to go back.”
Both men turned to look at their foreign friend, certain that they had misheard him, “You want to go back? What? You want a go at the Tiger like Tibbett had?”
Tibbett was too astonished to acknowledge Avaric’s continued badgering, “You must be crazy.”
“The unspeakable evil,” Fiyero spoke again, “she’s not evil. She’s just,” what was the best way to explain her? Explain Elphaba. Her name had resounded in his mind over and over from the moment he learned it. Her eyes haunted his dreams, the memory his every waking moment.
“Ah, that’s why he wants to go back. He’s found himself a girlfriend.”
“I’m pretty sure that any girlfriend you find there will give you the rot in your pants,” Tibbett harrumphed loudly, bitter about the entire experience, and rightfully so.
“Tell us about this she, then,” Avaric prodded, “have you seen her again?”
“She’s the unspeakable evil,” Fiyero attempted to explain.
“I thought you said she wasn’t?”
“He’s obviously confused. Love cloud’s ones judgement. Does funny things to their intelligence.” It was Tibbett’s turn to tease now.
“Love?”
The voice was an unwelcome intrusion in their conversation but a lovely one nonetheless, “Lady Galinda,” Avaric spoke, rising.
She rewarded him with a look of pure disgust before taking a seat aside Fiyero, “Who is in love?”
“Nobody,” Tibbett quickly answered, wanting no disclosure of their little jaunt, “it was simply a discussion about love. And why it’s a bad, bad idea. One that should be discarded immediately.”
Fiyero shook his head, “No. I want to go back. They call her evil but she’s not. She’s the opposite of evil. She doesn’t deserve to be there.”
“Most teenage girls don’t want to be at home,” Galinda stated matter-of-factly, “and let’s face it, we can be a little bit evil sometimes.”
“That’s for sure,” Avaric chimed in, “but he’s not talking about that. He’s talking about the evil thingy at the Philosophy Club.”
“The Philosophy Club?” Galinda looked shocked, “You went to the Philosophy Club?”
Silence lingered between the boys, eyes silently chiding Avaric. Finally, Fiyero spoke, “It was my idea. I wanted to see what the unspeakable evil was. I’ve seen so much in my travels I was certain that it was something I had seen before. It was not but it is somebody I want to see again.”
“Oh,” Galinda said softly, “Fiyero, you probably don’t want to see somebody there. Unspeakable things may happen to..to…” it was unlady like to tell him that things would probably fall off if he were to become serious with somebody from a place like that, “It’s best you just forget her.”
Frustrated, Fiyero raised a hand to his brow, “No. She’s not one of them. She’s trapped there. The things they’re doing. I want to go back because I want to free her.”
Avaric nearly choked on the healthy serving of saffron cream he’d just licked from the spoon, “You want to take something out of the Philosophy Club? Now I know you’re nuts.”
“They’ve put people to death for such things.”
“I would risk it.” Fiyero answered in defiance, “Nobody deserves that. I can keep her someplace safe if I can just get her out of there.”
“And taking her from one prison to place her in another is beneficial how?” Avaric grinned, sure that his witty demeanor would finally derive the attention he deserved from the Lady Galinda.
“That’s quite possibly the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard,” Galinda sighed, “you should take note. He’s willing to risk his life for a girl. Chivalry at its finest.”
Avaric rolled his eyes, “Or stupidity at its strongest.”
Galinda nodded solemnly, “Love does make us do stupid things.”
“It isn’t love. It’s doing what’s right,” Fiyero interjected, “She was beautiful, though. Breathtaking. Unlike any other I’ve ever seen.”
Avaric leaned over, as if to tell a secret, “That sounds like love. At the very least, it’s attraction. Think with the head on your shoulders, Fiyero. You can’t go back to that place. None of us will go with you.”
“I’ll go,” Galinda said, sitting up straighter.
“What?” Avaric asked, surprised, “It’s a suicide mission. They’re likely to have both of your heads. They’ll hang them at the gate as warning to the next idiots that try.”
Fiyero looked hopeful, “Galinda, how goes your sorcery seminars? Have you been able to learn anything useful.”
“I’m still a novice,” she answered sheepishly, “well, more of an intermediate novice. I have much more talent than those that I’m in class with.”
“A novice won’t do. We need somebody powerful,” Fiyero answered, standing from the table. “We meet again here on Friday evening.”
“And where are you going? We weren’t done,” Tibbett protested, “We have other plans to make!”
“Not now. There are more important things at hand.”
Fiyero did not wait another moment before disappearing into the crowd of people on the street. He moved with intention towards the eastern border of Shiz. Whether or not the old woman actually existed, he was not sure. She may not have been more than a rumor but if she was real, and he prayed to the so-called Unnamed God that she was, she may be able to help him.
--
The eastern border of Shiz was far less glamorous than its three siblings. The streets were littered with students who had failed at the various Universities but refused to go home, whether it be out of shame or defiance. The occasional coin dropped into empty mugs, punctuated by a curse of the recipient.
It was never enough.
Fiyero looked for the small red shanty that had been described to him, shrouded in pots of unusual plants. For a fleeting moment he felt as if he was part of a children’s tale that he’d heard from his parents growing up, looking for the lair of the evil witch. His tale was different, though. He wasn’t seeking the help of a witch for his own needs.
His intentions were honest and selfless.
Mostly.
“The building you seek is not there,” a familiar voice said from behind. Fiyero turned to find the old crone from the Philosophy Club, “it’s this way.”
Fiyero pulled his arm away, “You. I know you.”
“And I know you, and what you seek. It can be done. Yackle will help you.”
“Yackle,” Fiyero said in a low tone. So she was real, “Yes. I need Yackle.”
“Then you’ve got her, you young fool. This way.” Over broken cobbles and passed out drunks, she led Fiyero down a twisted path. He felt as if he had lost all sense of direction, East became West, North became South. The slum swirled around him until they came to a jarring stop and he was sitting at a table with the old woman.
A knowing grin spread over her lips as she stirred a pot of tea, “Tell me why you’re here, boy.”
Confused, Fiyero looked around, trying to regain his senses. He looked around the room, still not certain of how he had arrived there. His eyes focused at a doorway across the room from him. It looked like the doorway at the Philosophy Club, “You said you knew why,” he answered slowly, finally drawing his eyes back to her. “Where are we?”
“You know where we are.”
“I thought I did,” he said, “but that door. That door is not where we are. That door is from the club.”
“For every entrance, there is an exit.”
Fiyero immediately stood up, “There’s an exit and you’ve just left her there? Let her out. She doesn’t want to be there.”
“Elphaba does not know wants or needs. She only exists.”
“Then you do not know her,” he answered, still standing over the woman, still poised to open the door himself if the woman would not help him.
“Are you proposing that you do, foolish boy? After only a few moments?”
“More than you claim to.”
“I have known Elphaba since she was an infant. I have known the hopes of her mother and father, their disappointments and failures. All laid in her. I know more of Elphaba than one could hope to ever know.” Her words were pointed at him and she took hold of his wrist, “Sit down.”
“Where are her parents? They cannot be agreeable to these conditions.”
“Her family are of important station. To them, she no longer exists. Elphaba’s story, the public story, is a one of tragedy and overwhelming sadness.”
“And her story now?”
“Unknown to anybody of importance,” Yackle said, her voice low and grainy, as aged as she was, “And yet, you’re interested. Why?”
Try as though he might, Fiyero couldn’t verbalize what it was about the situation, what it was about Elphaba. Certainly he’d seen inequities before, many times over. Even in his own kingdom where he sat in a palace never knowing what it meant to go without while so many of his people lived in poverty. He was no stranger to class or lack thereof.
She was beautiful, and her skin, the color of emeralds. He had never seen beauty like hers but still, he didn’t feel it was the answer.
“You don’t know,” Yackle finally said for him, “but I do.”
“You do?”
When she dipped her head in a slow nod, Fiyero would swear that he heard every single vertebrae in her neck break loose, cracking as if she may break right there. He tilted his own head to the side, awaiting her explanation.
“Elphaba,” she said in a hushed tone, “she is your fate.”
Fiyero raised his head, looking down at the woman as he evaluated the words. Elphaba was his fate? How could she be his fate? And what sort of fate was she? The word fate itself carried so many connotations; death, life, everything in between.
“She is my death,” he concluded, “my friends feel that it is something of a suicide mission to-“ Fiyero fell short then, afraid to give away what he wanted to do, despite the fact that the old woman seemed to already know.
“Fate reaches beyond death.”
“Then how do I fulfill that fate when she is out of my reach?” It was the easiest way to ask how to free her without asking how to free her.
“You will come back to the Philosophy Club. One week from this day. Bring the same party, along with the short one and the woman. Be as prepared as you might. An opportunity will present itself. You must not hesitate or all could be lost. Lives included.”
Fiyero had already verbalized his willingness to risk his life but talking his friends into doing the same would not be so easy.
Yackle stood then, walked over to the door that he had watched in silence for so long and pulled it open. It was but a simple cupboard. She smiled at his confusion, “I said every entrance has an exit. I did not say that this was hers. No go about your business, boy. I have too much of my own.”
Without explanation, mere moments later, Fiyero was standing at the gates of Shiz University as if he hadn’t even traveled to the eastern boundaries. He blinked twice, the conversation still fresh in his mind.
Elphaba was his fate.
Fandom: Book
Characters: General Cast
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Implied non-con, captivity, physical abuse.
Summary: Based off of the Gregory Maguire Wicked Years, AU. The Philosophy Club is everything it's rumored to be; disgusting and filthy with unspeakable acts happening in every corner. What Fiyero Tigelaar didn't expect was to find an enchanting emerald woman locked away in the basement, a slave to the club's mysterious owners. Warnings for non-con, captivity, physical abuse, and language.
Fiyero lurched forward at the sharp pain against the back of his head. He reached up with a slight scowl to rub the spot before turning to Avaric, “That was for-“
“Not being here, of course,” his companion replied with a smirk, “you’re gone. Again.”
“I’m right here as I have always been.”
Avaric shook his head, “We left you outside the Philosophy Club. You’re worse than Tibbett with the Ti-“
Tibbett slammed his hand down on the table to interrupt Avaric, “I told you to stop talking about that. It was the club. It was something in the drink. It was not me, I’m telling you.”
Avaric only laughed in response, “I hear you’re a real Animal in the sack.”
Tibbett’s face turned a furious shade of red, rivaling the deep ochre of Fiyero’s skin tone, “Drop it.”
Sensing another fight brewing on the subject, Fiyero interjected, “They don’t really have the most unspeakable evil there.”
“I think if you ask our friend Tibbett, he’d disagree.”
“Avaric! Forget it happened!”
“I want to go back.”
Both men turned to look at their foreign friend, certain that they had misheard him, “You want to go back? What? You want a go at the Tiger like Tibbett had?”
Tibbett was too astonished to acknowledge Avaric’s continued badgering, “You must be crazy.”
“The unspeakable evil,” Fiyero spoke again, “she’s not evil. She’s just,” what was the best way to explain her? Explain Elphaba. Her name had resounded in his mind over and over from the moment he learned it. Her eyes haunted his dreams, the memory his every waking moment.
“Ah, that’s why he wants to go back. He’s found himself a girlfriend.”
“I’m pretty sure that any girlfriend you find there will give you the rot in your pants,” Tibbett harrumphed loudly, bitter about the entire experience, and rightfully so.
“Tell us about this she, then,” Avaric prodded, “have you seen her again?”
“She’s the unspeakable evil,” Fiyero attempted to explain.
“I thought you said she wasn’t?”
“He’s obviously confused. Love cloud’s ones judgement. Does funny things to their intelligence.” It was Tibbett’s turn to tease now.
“Love?”
The voice was an unwelcome intrusion in their conversation but a lovely one nonetheless, “Lady Galinda,” Avaric spoke, rising.
She rewarded him with a look of pure disgust before taking a seat aside Fiyero, “Who is in love?”
“Nobody,” Tibbett quickly answered, wanting no disclosure of their little jaunt, “it was simply a discussion about love. And why it’s a bad, bad idea. One that should be discarded immediately.”
Fiyero shook his head, “No. I want to go back. They call her evil but she’s not. She’s the opposite of evil. She doesn’t deserve to be there.”
“Most teenage girls don’t want to be at home,” Galinda stated matter-of-factly, “and let’s face it, we can be a little bit evil sometimes.”
“That’s for sure,” Avaric chimed in, “but he’s not talking about that. He’s talking about the evil thingy at the Philosophy Club.”
“The Philosophy Club?” Galinda looked shocked, “You went to the Philosophy Club?”
Silence lingered between the boys, eyes silently chiding Avaric. Finally, Fiyero spoke, “It was my idea. I wanted to see what the unspeakable evil was. I’ve seen so much in my travels I was certain that it was something I had seen before. It was not but it is somebody I want to see again.”
“Oh,” Galinda said softly, “Fiyero, you probably don’t want to see somebody there. Unspeakable things may happen to..to…” it was unlady like to tell him that things would probably fall off if he were to become serious with somebody from a place like that, “It’s best you just forget her.”
Frustrated, Fiyero raised a hand to his brow, “No. She’s not one of them. She’s trapped there. The things they’re doing. I want to go back because I want to free her.”
Avaric nearly choked on the healthy serving of saffron cream he’d just licked from the spoon, “You want to take something out of the Philosophy Club? Now I know you’re nuts.”
“They’ve put people to death for such things.”
“I would risk it.” Fiyero answered in defiance, “Nobody deserves that. I can keep her someplace safe if I can just get her out of there.”
“And taking her from one prison to place her in another is beneficial how?” Avaric grinned, sure that his witty demeanor would finally derive the attention he deserved from the Lady Galinda.
“That’s quite possibly the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard,” Galinda sighed, “you should take note. He’s willing to risk his life for a girl. Chivalry at its finest.”
Avaric rolled his eyes, “Or stupidity at its strongest.”
Galinda nodded solemnly, “Love does make us do stupid things.”
“It isn’t love. It’s doing what’s right,” Fiyero interjected, “She was beautiful, though. Breathtaking. Unlike any other I’ve ever seen.”
Avaric leaned over, as if to tell a secret, “That sounds like love. At the very least, it’s attraction. Think with the head on your shoulders, Fiyero. You can’t go back to that place. None of us will go with you.”
“I’ll go,” Galinda said, sitting up straighter.
“What?” Avaric asked, surprised, “It’s a suicide mission. They’re likely to have both of your heads. They’ll hang them at the gate as warning to the next idiots that try.”
Fiyero looked hopeful, “Galinda, how goes your sorcery seminars? Have you been able to learn anything useful.”
“I’m still a novice,” she answered sheepishly, “well, more of an intermediate novice. I have much more talent than those that I’m in class with.”
“A novice won’t do. We need somebody powerful,” Fiyero answered, standing from the table. “We meet again here on Friday evening.”
“And where are you going? We weren’t done,” Tibbett protested, “We have other plans to make!”
“Not now. There are more important things at hand.”
Fiyero did not wait another moment before disappearing into the crowd of people on the street. He moved with intention towards the eastern border of Shiz. Whether or not the old woman actually existed, he was not sure. She may not have been more than a rumor but if she was real, and he prayed to the so-called Unnamed God that she was, she may be able to help him.
--
The eastern border of Shiz was far less glamorous than its three siblings. The streets were littered with students who had failed at the various Universities but refused to go home, whether it be out of shame or defiance. The occasional coin dropped into empty mugs, punctuated by a curse of the recipient.
It was never enough.
Fiyero looked for the small red shanty that had been described to him, shrouded in pots of unusual plants. For a fleeting moment he felt as if he was part of a children’s tale that he’d heard from his parents growing up, looking for the lair of the evil witch. His tale was different, though. He wasn’t seeking the help of a witch for his own needs.
His intentions were honest and selfless.
Mostly.
“The building you seek is not there,” a familiar voice said from behind. Fiyero turned to find the old crone from the Philosophy Club, “it’s this way.”
Fiyero pulled his arm away, “You. I know you.”
“And I know you, and what you seek. It can be done. Yackle will help you.”
“Yackle,” Fiyero said in a low tone. So she was real, “Yes. I need Yackle.”
“Then you’ve got her, you young fool. This way.” Over broken cobbles and passed out drunks, she led Fiyero down a twisted path. He felt as if he had lost all sense of direction, East became West, North became South. The slum swirled around him until they came to a jarring stop and he was sitting at a table with the old woman.
A knowing grin spread over her lips as she stirred a pot of tea, “Tell me why you’re here, boy.”
Confused, Fiyero looked around, trying to regain his senses. He looked around the room, still not certain of how he had arrived there. His eyes focused at a doorway across the room from him. It looked like the doorway at the Philosophy Club, “You said you knew why,” he answered slowly, finally drawing his eyes back to her. “Where are we?”
“You know where we are.”
“I thought I did,” he said, “but that door. That door is not where we are. That door is from the club.”
“For every entrance, there is an exit.”
Fiyero immediately stood up, “There’s an exit and you’ve just left her there? Let her out. She doesn’t want to be there.”
“Elphaba does not know wants or needs. She only exists.”
“Then you do not know her,” he answered, still standing over the woman, still poised to open the door himself if the woman would not help him.
“Are you proposing that you do, foolish boy? After only a few moments?”
“More than you claim to.”
“I have known Elphaba since she was an infant. I have known the hopes of her mother and father, their disappointments and failures. All laid in her. I know more of Elphaba than one could hope to ever know.” Her words were pointed at him and she took hold of his wrist, “Sit down.”
“Where are her parents? They cannot be agreeable to these conditions.”
“Her family are of important station. To them, she no longer exists. Elphaba’s story, the public story, is a one of tragedy and overwhelming sadness.”
“And her story now?”
“Unknown to anybody of importance,” Yackle said, her voice low and grainy, as aged as she was, “And yet, you’re interested. Why?”
Try as though he might, Fiyero couldn’t verbalize what it was about the situation, what it was about Elphaba. Certainly he’d seen inequities before, many times over. Even in his own kingdom where he sat in a palace never knowing what it meant to go without while so many of his people lived in poverty. He was no stranger to class or lack thereof.
She was beautiful, and her skin, the color of emeralds. He had never seen beauty like hers but still, he didn’t feel it was the answer.
“You don’t know,” Yackle finally said for him, “but I do.”
“You do?”
When she dipped her head in a slow nod, Fiyero would swear that he heard every single vertebrae in her neck break loose, cracking as if she may break right there. He tilted his own head to the side, awaiting her explanation.
“Elphaba,” she said in a hushed tone, “she is your fate.”
Fiyero raised his head, looking down at the woman as he evaluated the words. Elphaba was his fate? How could she be his fate? And what sort of fate was she? The word fate itself carried so many connotations; death, life, everything in between.
“She is my death,” he concluded, “my friends feel that it is something of a suicide mission to-“ Fiyero fell short then, afraid to give away what he wanted to do, despite the fact that the old woman seemed to already know.
“Fate reaches beyond death.”
“Then how do I fulfill that fate when she is out of my reach?” It was the easiest way to ask how to free her without asking how to free her.
“You will come back to the Philosophy Club. One week from this day. Bring the same party, along with the short one and the woman. Be as prepared as you might. An opportunity will present itself. You must not hesitate or all could be lost. Lives included.”
Fiyero had already verbalized his willingness to risk his life but talking his friends into doing the same would not be so easy.
Yackle stood then, walked over to the door that he had watched in silence for so long and pulled it open. It was but a simple cupboard. She smiled at his confusion, “I said every entrance has an exit. I did not say that this was hers. No go about your business, boy. I have too much of my own.”
Without explanation, mere moments later, Fiyero was standing at the gates of Shiz University as if he hadn’t even traveled to the eastern boundaries. He blinked twice, the conversation still fresh in his mind.
Elphaba was his fate.