The Witch and the Wildcat

[wildkate]

Her classes finished for the day, Katelyn had little else to do and no particular desire to go back inside another building when the weather was so pleasant. Whereas most students would be busy listening to CD's or watching television or making plans to go to the mall in their free time, Katelyn instead fell backwards onto a grassy hillside near

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[_nogooddeed]

Elphaba turned, not needing to see who it was, from the horrid mispronounciation of her name. She walked over to Katelyn, waving, not bothering to correct her.

"Hi." She plopped down next to Katelyn. "You're Katelyn, right?"

[wildkate]

"Yes, I am Katelyn. And you...you are very green, just as you said on the computer box." The tone of her voice was filled with naive curiosity as she stated the most obvious of truths, not meaning those words in a harsh manner at all. "I have never seen that color on any except the Dryad. You come from where?"

[_nogooddeed]

Elphaba's first reaction, upon hearing the blunt truth of her skin color, was to say something mean. She bit back the instict, understanding that Katelyn was abrasively naive.

"I... I don't know what the Dryad is, but I come from Oz. It's... very hard to give directions on how to get there. You have to fly; it's up past the clouds. Most people there are of normal colors... I'm just as odd there as I am here."

Elphaba laid her head back on the grass, staring up at the blue sky, wondering how far away Oz really was, and if there was a way back.

[wildkate]

"The Dryad are the children of the forest, and they are often colored in browns and greens. But they are shy and reclusive, even for Fey, and rarely stray far from their trees." She then paused for a moment, to think of the words Elphaba used in their earlier conversation. "So green is a normal color. It is just, not natural for human girls."

Turning her own eyes skyward once again, she lost herself in the clouds above. "The clouds are beautiful, especially on days like this. This world called 'Oz' must be very special, yes."

[_nogooddeed]

"Green isn't normal," was all Elphaba could say. After all, nobody had ever said that green is a normal color. Ever.

"Are the Dryad a lot like humans? Y'know, with arms and legs and faces?" Obviously, that wasn't the reason Elphaba was green, but... to think that SOMEONE was like her... was odd, to say the least.

Then, she looked down, plucking grass and twisting the strands between her fingers. "Oz isn't that special. People say it's great... nobody looks beneath the surface."

[wildkate]

"They are not like humans, they are Fey, things born of nature." Katelyn lifted her arms from where they idly rested at her sides, her hands trying to tell as much of the story as her lips. "But they do have arms and legs, as we do. Their skin is like fine wood, their hair the leaves of the forest. I, do not know many, as they almost never wish to be seen. I think more are a light brown than green, but it often depends on the tree to which they are bound."

After happily babbling on about one of the few topics she was knowledgeable about, she settled down as she listened to Elphaba continue about her native land. "Look beneath the surface?", she asked. "There are many caves then? It is a different kind of beauty than the world above the ground, but, there is a peace and a calm about the caverns..."

[OOC: And for anyone who's not a big as big a D&D geek as I am here's the picture from the Monster Manual. Not the best one in the world, but it gets the point across.]

[_nogooddeed]

Elphaba slowly took in the information about the strange creatures Katelyn spoke of, but then she laid her head back, staring at the sky.

"No, not caves. Look beneath the surface... it's a figure of speech. Like, on the surface, Oz seems great, with Animals that talk, and fruitful harvests, and a great city of emeralds, and a magnificent wizard that rules over everyone. But nobody... nobody looked beyond that image, noticed that the city of Emeralds wasn't real, that Animals were being prosectuted... people were always fixated on the image of things, not on what things really are."

[wildkate]

Katelyn smiled as she heard of the wonders that lie on the surface, but this smile turned into an awkward look of confusion as Elphaba continued. "Animals are...being...prisecuded?" Shrugging off her initial concern for the animals, Kate instead asked about Oz in general. "It does sound lovely. But what do you mean, how things really are? What are they really?"

[_nogooddeed]

"Animals... with a capital A," Elphaba corrected. "Prosecuted... it means that even though they could talk, and think, and work, and anything that humans could do, the government was taking away their rights, banishing them back to the farms and forests. Some of them even stopped speaking." She paused, thinking. "My teacher and mentor was a Goat named Dillamond. He was killed because he was uncovering the horrors happening

[wildkate]

Though she understood little about politics, Katelyn listened to the story with much interest. Just the idea that others could speak to the animals, capital "A" or otherwise, amazed her.

"It...does sound complicated," she finally agreed. "But building cities, destroying the land, allowing people to starve with famine and drought? It does sound bad. This wizard, does not sound wonderful to me."

[_nogooddeed]

"Well, that's because he's NOT wonderful," Elphaba replied curtly. Remembering her home angered her; she tended to avoid it.

"I suppose my old home isn't that important to you," Elphaba said, wanting to stop thinking about Oz. "Where do you come from?"

[wildkate]

"Everything is important to someone. And to me also - I have much to learn." Her interest was genuine, as Katelyn had much to learn about nearly all facets of human life just to catch up with the common knowledge that everyone was expected to already know.

"Where I come from?" She closed her eyes as the mental images of her homeland coursed through her mind. "Originally, I come from here. In America. Which is very strange, because I am more native here than most students. It is, funny, I think." Katelyn paused for a moment, as she considered that irony. "But my true homeland is a world far away called 'Amazon'. It is a land of forests and a mighty river that cuts a path through all. There are many birds, and trees, and plants, and animals, and insects, and beasts..." Her voice then grew a bit distant. "But almost no humans. No one else but Katelyn."

[_nogooddeed]

Elphaba thought for a moment, thinking that she might've read something about the Amazon Rainforest in a book, once. She turned to look into Katelyn's faraway eyes.

"No other humans?" Elphaba tried to picture the place... the river, the sound of tropical birds, the murmuring, or maybe crashing, of the river. "It sounds nice."

[wildkate]

"Yes...it is very nice." Katelyn sighed. "But, it is also very difficult. Not many could live in the forests like I have

[_nogooddeed]

Elphaba quietly took in everything about Katelyn's life. It was nice talking to her, sharing stories of their lives.

"It's very nice to talk to you, Katelyn," Elphaba said, voicing her thoughts. "Most aren't very fond of talking to me for a long time. So, um... do you like it here at St. Catherines?"

[wildkate]

"Thank you," the other girl replied. "You seem nice as well."

"Um..." Katelyn idly stared at the clouds for a bit as she thought. "I do like it here, I think. There are many, interesting people to meet. I, do not know if I really fit in here, but I will try. The girls here, at least, seem to be more accepting of strangers than others that I have met."

[OOC: Just -had- to. Couldn't help myself.]