Once in Oz 1.3

Pan knelt where Felix and Toodles had fallen through, placing one hand on the ground.  He could barely feel any residual magic. 

“What was that?” one of the Lost Boys asked.

“A portal,” he answered, his eyes half closed.  “The question is, where did it take them.”

No, he thought, drawing back his hand.  Why not the Enchanted Forest, or even Wonderland?  Anywhere would be better than there. 

“Oz,” he answered, standing.  “Of all places-“ He stopped and kicked at a rock.

“Can’t you send the shadow to bring them back?”

“No, Oz is closed to me now,” Pan said.  He looked around at the other boys, his pensive expression replaced by a more optimistic one.  “Don’t worry, lads.  Felix can handle most anything; they’ll be fine.  I’ll think of some way to get them back.”

Some of them nodded, others continued to stare at the ground as if they expected another portal to appear and swallow them too. 

Pan picked his spear up off the ground.  “Come on boys, let’s get back to camp.”

They started back through the forest.

“Are they really going to be all right?” Jonathan asked in a low tone.

Pan nodded.  “They’ll be fine.  As long as they don’t go to Glinda.”

                                                  . . .

“I have an idea,” Toodles said.  “Let’s find Glinda.  She’s supposed to be good.  She should know a way to get us home.”

“The Good Witch of the North?” Natalie said, raising an eyebrow.

“South,” Toodles corrected.

“Either way,” she said, “that’s not where we are.  And I can’t even find the yellow brick road.  Of course, the monkeys don’t let me get very far.”

“So first we have to get the monkeys on our side.”

“Don’t they work for a wicked witch?”

“Only because she has the magic hat.  They have to obey whoever owns it,” Toodles said.

“How do you know that?” Natalie asked.

“It was in the book,” he said, looking at her incredulously.

“Oh, I forgot there were books.”

“How do you know about Oz then?”

“I’ve seen the movie a few times,” she answered.

Toodles eyes widened.  “They made a movie?”

Natalie nodded.

“With sound?”

“Mmhmm.”

“And color?”

“Yes.”

“Anyway, about the monkeys,” Felix interrupted.

“Right,” Toodles said.  “We’ll have to find the witch’s castle and steal her hat.  Once it’s ours, we can make the monkeys do whatever we want.”  He turned to Natalie.  “You haven’t happened to see a castle while you’ve been here have you?”

She shook her head.  “I haven’t seen any buildings at all.”

Toodles nodded, thought for a second, then shrugged.  “Then we’ll just have to start walking.  Eventually we’ll either find our way out of this part of the country or the witch’s castle.”

“Ok,” Natalie said.  “Just let me get another stick first.  The monkeys will probably come back.”

                                                      . . .

Natalie tested the weight of her new weapon.  She now carried a tree branch the size of a walking stick, which the boys had helped her pull off a tree.  Then, Felix had brought out a buck bone knife, which must have had at least an eight inch blade, and cut off all the smaller twigs growing out of it.  This would definitely be of more use than the branches and rocks she had been using to fend the creatures off.

She wasn’t quite sure what to make of her new companions.  Toodles, more than a head shorter than herself, with wavy brown hair and a smile she had yet to see disappear was friendly and seemed good natured enough.  Felix was quieter, or at least had been so far, and harder to read.  She tried to blame her uneasiness about him on the scar running across his face from the middle of his forehead nearly to his jaw.  It was just years of media stereotypes telling her men with scars were up to no good.  Still, she thought, I’ll keep my eyes on him.  She was also having trouble with the idea that they should both be dead.  But even with her misgivings, she was glad for their company.  This wasn’t the type of place she wanted to travel in alone. 

The monkeys at least were more wary now that there were three of them.  They had been walking most of the day and hadn’t run into any again. 

“Look.” Toodles pointed ahead.  “That’s got to be where the wicked witch lives.”

Just coming into view was a large house, surrounded by a high stone wall.  Natalie didn’t think it was quite a castle, but it was close. 

“What kind of witch are we dealing with?” Felix asked. 

“I don’t really know,” Toodles answered, pausing.  “The book never really said much about her powers. Oh well,” he shrugged and started walking again, “she can’t be as bad as the Dark One.”

“So you two have had experience with witches before then?” she asked.

“Sort of,” Toodles said.  “Besides, the Dark One is much worse than a witch.”

“It’ll be dark by the time we get there,” Felix said, mentally measuring the distance between them and the castle.  “I don’t much like the idea of going up against any kind of witch in the dark.”

“Maybe we’ll be lucky and she’ll be asleep,” Toodles said.  “Then we can take the hat and go before she knows we were there.”

It’s never that easy in the stories, Natalie thought, but kept it to herself.

Once Upon a Time in Oz 1.2

It really didn’t feel like he fell for very long.  Almost before he could register what had happened the wind and the noise stopped.  He was falling through midair, plummeting fast. 

This is going to hurt, he thought, praying he wouldn’t break anything.  He landed hard on his back, the impact driving all the air from his lungs.  He lay still for a moment, hoping that soon he’d be able to breathe, almost afraid to move anything.  When he didn’t experience any shooting pain, he sat up cautiously.

“Felix,” he choked out between gasps for air. 

“Right here,” the other boy grunted, off to Toodles’s right, pulling himself to his hands and knees.

Where are we? Toodles shook his head and looked around.  They’d fallen into some kind of hill country, dotted with clumps of trees.  He blinked and shook his head again.  No, it all still looked the same.  He rubbed his eyes.  Maybe he’d hit his head when he landed.

“Felix, is everything blue?”

Felix pushed his hair out of his eyes and sighed. “Yeah.”

“Oh.”  Everything, grass, leaves, the bark on the trees, were different shades of blue.   Even the sky seemed a bluer blue than the skies of Neverland and Earth.     

“Why…” Toodles started.

“Shh,” Felix said softly, holding up a hand to stop him.  “Hear that?”

Toodles listened and soon picked up the sound Felix meant.  Leaves rusting and some kind of shrieking animal cry.  It sounded like they were fighting. 

“What do you think those are?”  He glanced down at the crossbow in his hand,  nodding satisfaction when he saw it hadn’t been damaged in the fall.

“I don’t know.” Felix stood and shouldered his club.  “Let’s go see.  It might help us figure out where we are.”

Toodles scrambled to his feet, snatching up the arrows that had fallen from his quiver.

The boys made for the sound as quickly as they could while staying quiet enough to hopefully keep the creatures from hearing them.  When they got to the top of a nearby hill they saw the source of the racket. 

“Monkeys!” Toodles exclaimed, staring down at them.  “Monkeys with wings.”

More than half a dozen of the creatures hopped and flapped around something near a group of trees.  One screeched in pain and three of them fluttered back.  That gave Toodles a view of their prey.  A girl stood in the midst of them, franticly trying to beat the monkeys back with a tree branch.  But with so many, it didn’t look like she would be able to hold them off long. 

“She needs help,” Toodles said, fitting an arrow to his crossbow and starting down the hill. 

Once they reached the bottom, Toodles raised his crossbow.

“Careful what you hit,” Felix cautioned.

As tightly packed as the creatures were, Toodles felt certain he could hit one, even with all of their movement. 

He fired an arrow at the largest monkey.  The creature jumped, reaching for the tree branch so the arrow struck its leg instead of its back.  It screeched and redoubled its attack on the girl.  Toodles fired another arrow, catching another monkey’s wing.  By this time, Felix was close enough to bash them with his club. 

That was when the monkeys started to realize they were being attacked from another quarter.  Toodles put another arrow in the monkey with the injured wing, killing it.  Some of the monkeys flapped up into the trees while some of the bolder ones turned to face the new threat. 

Toodles shot at the monkey coming towards him, but in his haste, the arrow went wide.  The creature zoomed over his head, grabbing his hood.  Toodles shouted and tried to beat it off with his unloaded crossbow.  The monkey jerked hard on his hood, snapping his neck back and pulling him to the ground. 

With their initial fear of the newcomers abated, and, seeing that they still had superior numbers, the monkeys in the trees swooped down, attempting to overwhelm Felix and the girl. 

Toodles grabbed an arrow out of his quiver with his left hand and jabbed it behind him.  The first time he missed, but the second he stabbed the creature’s arm.  It snarled and leaned over him, baring its teeth.  Toodles brought his cross bow up over his head and slammed it down on the monkey’s back.  It yelped and loosened its hold on him.  Toodles kicked it off and started fitting the arrow in his hand to the string of his bow.  The monkey skipped off to the side and hopped into the air, one wing flapping oddly.

When it didn’t turn to face him again, Toodles shifted his attention to the rest.  Most of them were taking to the trees again, while the few brave, or stupid, ones kept the humans busy.  Toodles fired two shots up at the monkeys, killing one and wounding another.  One of the remaining creatures gave an undulating cry and they all began to take wing, flying away this time. 

The girl clubbed one of the slower ones with her tree branch and turned as if to strike another, nearly hitting Felix instead.  He brought his club up instinctively and the branch broke when the two collided.  She gave a little yelp of surprise, her eyes still wide with fear.

“Easy,” Felix said, holding up his free hand.  “It’s all right.”

She dropped what was left of her branch and the two stood, panting for a moment. 

Toodles looked the girl up and down.  She looked around Felix’s age- maybe eighteen-and was around a head shorted than the other boy.  She had dark hair, brown eyes and Toodles guessed she was reasonably pretty.  With the dirt smudging her face and the blood dripping from a busted lower lip, as well as two scratches under the corner of her right eyes, it was hard to tell.  She was dressed in a fashion similar to what most of the Lost Boys came in since the mid- 2000’s.  Blue jeans, a bright red shirt and a plaid button down shirt over it.  She carried a blue drawstring bag slung over her back.

“Thank you,” she said, taking a step back and wiping the blood off her chin with the back of her hand.  “Those things have been after me for days.”

“Do you live here?” Toodles asked, starting to pick up the arrows that were scattered over the ground.  

“No,” she said.  “ I just got here a few days ago.  A tornado picked me up and dropped me here.”

Toodles noticed she had a slight twang to her speech, similar to the way Felix spoke but not quite the same. 

“So you don’t know where we are then?” Felix asked.

The girl opened her mouth to answer but Toodles cut her off.  “I know where we are,” he said.  “Flying monkeys, tornados, it can only be one place- Oz.”

Felix flashed him a questioning glance but the girl nodded.  “That’s what I figured too,” she said.

“Were you from back in the real world?  Earth I mean?” Toodles asked.

She studied him with a puzzled expression for a few seconds, then nodded.  “Yes. Where are you from?”

“Earth originally.”  Toodles now had all his arrows and went to stand by Felix.  “Both of us.  But we’ve been living in Neverland.”

“No way,” she said.  “That’s not…I mean its…” She paused.  “Actually I guess if Oz is real then Neverland has every right to be too.  Wow.  You’re not… Lost Boys, are you?”

“We are,” Toodles said.  She wasn’t the first to be surprised.  Ever since Disney made Peter Pan in the 1950’s, boys had been coming with misconceptions.  “I’ve been told the movie was different than the way things really are.”

“Obviously,” she said, looking mainly at Felix. 

“I’m Toodles.” He held out his hand.

“Natalie,” she said, shaking it.  It was the way men shook hands, which struck Toodles as odd at first, but she was wearing trousers too, so maybe things were different now.  Mike had said something about women trying to liberate themselves.  He decided it didn’t really matter.

“Pleased to meet you, Natalie.”  Toodles gestured to the other boy standing behind him.  “This is Felix.”

The two exchanged nods of acknowledgement. 

She looked down at Toodles.  “You know, I half expected you to say his name was Slightly.”

Toodles giggled.  “That’s a funny name.  Why?”

She blushed a little.  “It’s just, in the movie, and I think in the book too, there was a Toodles and then the tall blonde one was Slightly.  Or the tallest one anyway.  They were all about eight.”  She tried to look at Felix, but couldn’t meet his eyes.  “I’m sorry, I don’t know why I said that.  Long couple of days I guess.”

Toodles took up the conversation again before Felix could reply.  “The newer guys do usually say something about expecting us to be younger.  Pan doesn’t take little boys though.  They wouldn’t be as much fun.  I’m the youngest, and I’m twelve.”

“What year was it when you left?” he asked.

“2011,” she said.

“I’m from 1906,” Toodles said, grinning.

“Really?”

“Mm-hmm.” He nodded.  “That’s nothing.  George, he’s the only original Lost Boy still in Neverland, is around 300 years old.  Felix is the next oldest after him.  He’s from 186…2?”  He looked at Felix.

“’64,” the other boy muttered.

Natalie blinked twice, then nodded.  “How did you guys get here?”

“We fell through a portal,” Toodles said.  “One just  opened up under our feet.”

“Can you fly back?” she asked.

Toodles shook his head.  “The pixie flowers died a long time ago.”

“And of course, no ruby slippers.” She sighed.  “Looks like we’re stuck here.”