Chapter Text
As they took one last glance at their homeland, the Scarecrow's coarse burlap glove squeezed the Witch's green hand. He smiled at her, his crudely painted face somehow managing to express the multitude of emotions she was also feeling. Hope and fear, joy and grief, hesitation and love. She did her best to return the smile. They'd been traveling for days, hiding in the shadows of the night; hoping, against all odds, that the rumors and legends about the mystical Time Dragon Clock were true. And now here they were, on the verge of a new beginning – wherever and whatever it would be.
"Ready?"
"Not at all,"he shook his head, the small smile still on his lips. "But let's do this."
She nodded. Hand in hand, they stepped into the dark, unexamined insides of the Time Dragon Clock, walking blindly into what they hoped was going to be a different world, a different life. What lay behind them was lost. What lay ahead was unknown. The only thing they knew for sure was that they were together, clinging tight to the other's hand. But they were soon to be stripped out of even that last shred of certainty. The darkness, thick as a bucket of tar, surrounded them, pulling them apart; making it more and more difficult for the Witch to maintain her grip on the Scarecrow's hand. She cried out in pain and felt him momentarily let go, but when she desperately scrambled for his fingers, it was too late – the pitch-black wave had already washed her away.
Her feet landed heavily on solid ground, causing her to almost lose her balance. She blinked, blinded by the sudden beam of light, and froze in shock when she finally regained the ability to perceive her surroundings. She recognized the place instantly, even though she hadn't seen it for what felt like a lifetime: a bronze statue in a cobbled square, well-tended flowerbeds, maple trees, and dozens of young people clad in white and navy uniforms. Her body immediately took on a fighting stance, ready to fight the impending attack, but to her surprise, no one seemed particularly affected by her presence.
"Miss, you'll disturb him!"
She turned around rapidly and froze in shock as she gazed into a – miraculously familiar – pair of deep blue eyes. Just as stunned as she was, he sat motionless for what felt like an eternity, before jumping out of the cart and trotting up to her.
"Are you alright?" he asked. When she answered with a simple nod, still too stunned to speak, he leaned in slightly closer than necessary and said, in a whisper barely louder than a breath: "My dorm. Thirty minutes. We need to talk."
She was pretty sure he opened the door before her knuckles had even touched it, and his eyes remained fixated on hers while she slipped into the room.
"So…" he started with a slight quiver in his voice.
"So…" she repeated dumbly.
"So… you haven't slapped me, yelled at me or run away… and now, you're here… So I'm assuming you're… you know… you."
Hearing his pleading voice, Elphaba finally found her ability to form semi-coherent sentences.
"I'm me," she confirmed and immediately demanded the same from him. "And you… you're actually back to…"
Without a word, he reached for her hand and placed it over his heart, as if trying to convince them both of his newly regained humanity. She cupped his cheek, stroking it gently with her thumb and admiring the texture of his skin – no longer scratchy and coarse, but smooth, silky and warm, as it once had been. Her hands moved from his cheeks, got tangled in his hair, travelled down the back of his neck, onto his shoulders, then his chest, then along his arms; wandering around his body with love and amazement and longing, trying to take in every inch of him, every patch of skin, every muscle; noticing how real they were, how wonderfully human again.
"I can't believe it," she whispered. "How…? Why…?"
"Don't look at me," he said, tapping his temple. "No brain, remember?"
But she still needed more proof. She rose onto her tiptoes and kissed him; losing herself in his scent, his warm breath, his soft lips; letting the emotions she hadn't even been aware of suppressing overflow her. He slid his arm around her waist, making her shiver as his hand wandered up and down her back; turning her back into a wide-eyed college girl she'd once been. Despite everything they'd been through, in that moment, they felt as if they were kissing each other for the very first time. Which, in a way, they were.
As they broke apart, catching their breaths, Fiyero smiled and gently tucked a loose strand of hair behind Elphaba's ear.
"Well," he muttered, "regardless of how or why, we seem to have… gone back."
"The Time Dragon Clock," she said slowly. "Well, we never did know what was going to happen when we walked through. The legends always talked about another world; a new beginning… It just never crossed my mind that it would… Do you really think we've just… gone back in time? Just like that?"
He shrugged. "Wouldn't be the craziest thing that's happened to us."
She thought about that for a minute.
"I saw Nessa on my way here," she confessed quietly, and the sadness in her voice surprised him.
"That's… good, right?"
"I don't know," she replied. "It was strange. I should have been ecstatic, but… I don't know, I feel like I've already started to accept it. That she was gone. And now, to allow myself to hope…" she bit her lip, unsure of how to put her feelings into words. "I just don't think I could take that heartbreak again."
Fiyero squeezed her arm gently in an attempt to comfort her.
"I'm sorry."
He wished he had something better to say, something that would ease her mind, but the situation they were in was not exactly one that he – or anyone, for that matter – had any experience with.
"I understand why you're afraid, but I think we have to take the risk. To believe that this, all of this, is real. That she is real, and that you and I… that we are real." He brushed her cheek with the back of his hand. "And if not, if this is all just some kind of a trick… Isn't it still better to make the best out of it while it lasts?"
She kept silent for a while, but a familiar crease in between her eyebrows assured Fiyero that she was reflecting on his words. Finally, she nodded, although the look on her face was serious.
"I suppose," she said. "But we need to be smart about this. Especially if it actually is real. Because maybe…" she hesitated. "Maybe we could fix it all this time? If we do this right, maybe we could make a change? And then maybe… maybe we could, you know… have another chance? I mean, you and I?" She looked at him and he was happy to see hope in her eyes, not just fear. Planting a kiss onto her forehead, he promised himself that he would do anything it took to make that hope live on.