A WIZ

A WIZ (complete)

By Carmen R. Cross

Intro.....

With light music, easy listening with a touch of blues melody in the background, Dorothy mouthed words relaying her own blue funk. To the tune of The 5th Dimension's song ... "One Less Man," Dorothy crooned...

No more bones to buy...

One less dog.... to go chase after...

I am missin' him sooooo -

I just can't deny -

...I just don't want to cry....

It's just OH...

So-o-o hard .... What heartache...

That I should suffer

Oh-h-h-h- oh oh oh oh...

She was interrupted by a faint sound in the near distance. From her bedroom, Dorothy could hear the light 'yapping' of the little dog next door. She had been oblivious to it... had not heard him until now, "Yip yip, er roo roo roo roo roo roo." It sounded like her own or the one she used to have. ToTo had been killed, or assumed so, three years ago when he leaped from the window of her car. She was returning from registration at school. The toy schnauzer never knew what happened. In the traffic of the Dan Ryan Expressway, ToTo was gone and Dorothy was left in a turmoil of emotion. He had been lost just outside the gateway of the "Hub." She had dreamt many times of his reappearance... Dreams that included scenes from their many escapades throughout her youth. The cold blustery day she had been lost in a Manhattan snowstorm... and not returned until several days later to the arms of her waiting family. It was Thanksgiving then. There was also the storm that had blown into town and lifted her and Toto up and away from the open spaces of Kansas. Wichita Falls was never an exciting place, but that storm was more than she or her aunt and uncle had bargained for. Through each incident, she had welcomed the return to famnily and companionship provided by Toto, her ever-faithful friend. In his absence, the days were long but certain to come as the days of the years are known to do.

She went over to the window to peek at the neighbor's dog. It was not a schnauzer, but a Pomeranian - a ball of tan fluff. The neighbor's dog Buppy was no comparison to her ToTo.... even with his constant alarm. As she approached the glass, the ball of fluff rose up on his hind legs toying with her; coaxing her to play. Smiling down at him she slid the window open and tossed a small ball into his yard. He ran after it returning once and flipping the ball high enough for her to scramble and catch. Again he tossed the ball. He retrieved it flipping it up to her again. It was almost as if ToTo was here - but she knew different. ToTo was lost, three years lost. She threw the ball one last time and retreated back into her room pulling the window shut. She thought now of her own future. College courses were going well and she would soon be a candidate for the higher level studies on campus. This meant she would be leaving home for her own space...a college dorm or apartment, but her own space. For the first time, she would be alone; and ToTo ...her usual companion was not available.

At dinner, while assisting her aunt with preparations for the table, she mentioned her options for continuing school. Emma was hesitant about her niece departing for any purpose. Since agreeing to raise her, she had guarded Dorothy by every means possible. Twice, she had almost lost her brother's child...first to a tornado and again to a terrible blizzard. A promise was a promise, and she had made that to her dying brother. Until now, she had kept that promise and raised Dorothy like the child she never had. College would be a new challenge. They had looked into many campuses but Dorothy was bent on attending the University of Rochester. Out of all her choices... Howard University in the nation's capital... Grambling in Georgia... Spellman in Alabama, Dorothy had chosen to remain with her selection of the university in the state of New York. She would attend the university upstate, not far from her uncle's prior residence. It was situated closely enough to Buffalo, New York but well within a distance to allow maintenance of solace. A small comunity like Rochester would provide more of her necessary security; a more peaceful and protected environment. Although they no longer had family members there in the state, her interest had developed with the first introduction to her father's brother Robert. He had moved away from the Buffalo suburb-Tonawanda and was long since in Michigan with several other Cross siblings. She would be alone for the two years remaining for a degree. They sat through dinner with no alternate plan. As they cleared away the dishes and remainder of the meal, Dorothy passed at the kitchen window in time to see a flash of light strike the ground. A loud terrified half shriek half bark came from the yard and Dorothy dashed out the kitchen door. To check her prior playmate. They had obviously forgotten he was outdoors. As she ran out, the sky cut loose pummeling her with hail and blinding rain. Another clap of lightning in the neighboring yard and thunder to echo its damage, was not enough to send her inside. As she neared the fence another bolt of lightning fell; this time catching the fence as she reached out to look over it. The bracelet on her arm radiated the effect. Instead of seeing Buppy, her head reeled with stars and colors blending into and around as in a kaleidascope. Moments later, she felt herself sliding through an opalescent tube of yellows...varied shades of white and tourmaline green.

When her vision cleared, she could see a trail of yellowed grass as if it had wilted from some terrible heat. It seemed to lead to a broader, brighter trail... A path of gold. Beyond it was what appeared to be the kitchen door. She stood to follow the yellowed grass. Follow it to return to familiar ground. Familiar ground that she should never have bolted out of in a raging electrical storm. She followed the trail of yellow grass until it became a solid trail of golden clay that soon led into a solid walkway of stones laid in a pattern unmistakable as the way out. She followed this toward what resembled her kitchen door a short distance away but further than she remembered. As she walked, now more surefooted than before, she passed signs discarded into open fields. "Dan Ryan".. "I-55"..."DELLSWAY"...none meaning much except that she was making progress of movement. Halfway along the supported walkway, she came upon and almost tripped over the outstreched tail of what resembled a lion. It was fuzzy faced with a mane of napped hair upon its head and face. The tanned body was muscular and extremities proportionate to the rest of the beast; but that tail from out of no place, was out of place. It, the beast, lay stretched across her path keeping her from passing the noisy doorway where it lounged. The sign overhead read BLUESTAR HEALTH & FITNESS but here he lay... Outside. As she stumbled to avoid falling over him, she could hear rhe clanging of heavy equipment beyond the glass wall and door. He lay outside in his hugeness until she startled him in her surprise. "Wow!" He jumped up and began to sashay back and forth before the doorway. Now and then a hand would find place on his hip...left or right, as he threw shoulder after shoulder in a prize catching strut. Then he roared again, "Wow!" Adding, "...get back...Now get back gal..." He turned, facing her with a menacing stance, roared one last, "Wow!" She steadied herself waiting for his assault. The lion like character was amusing but something of which to be cautious. He spoke, "What's up!" She was caught off guard. Not waiting for her response but noticing her apprehension, he announced, "Leo here - Ted Leo! Gal...What's up," and began to strut again. As he strutted the character broke into a pose, flexing muscle after muscle and roaring, "Wow! Get back!" She watched, amazed at his nerve and obvious bravado, thinking to herself... "This one's a real show off." More relaxed now she spoke up, "I'm trying to get home;" and attempted to step around him. "I know the way home!" He sounded confident in his suggestion of assistance. She paused turning after one step, if only to question his definition. He leaped slightly, landing on one knee flinging fuzzy arms out then bowing into a pectoral flex; "Yep... I know the way home!" Dorothy smiled at his outspoken mannerism, "Then show me the way home." Leo paused midflex and stood straightening his rumpled appearance. "For sure!", and flashed a blinding smile. He peered into the window of the health and fitness club shivering, "I shudder to think of stepping into that." He raised one fuzzy hand above his brow, "Look at them! Man, now that's somethin!" Dorothy joined him in peering intot eh glass, "What are they doing?" He responded , "Sweatin'. They are sweatin heavy!" "Why aren't you in there? They look about like you...flexing...execising... Why aren't you inside? He jumped back, "What?! Who?... Me?," gagging; "No way!" He was overwhelmed. "What I need...," pausing to fix his words, "...you see, I don't have the nerve! I can't do it like them, I just need to work up the nerve to go in. I been tryin' for a while now, but I haven't made it in yet." Her mouth dropped open. This one before her was not what anyone would have considered to have an ounce of cowardice. "I'll show you how to go home, if you go with me to work up the nerve." She peered inside again. "Why don't you just walk in?" He cut her off abruptly, "ehhh... Can't do that. Can't just walk in, I got to get the nerve." "Then let's go get the nerve...", she agreed with him, "..we will work on your nerves." They both turned and walked past the intrusion of the club doorway. Past the doubt of his existence. They walked together along the brick road toward an assured goal. The goal of working up nerve for Leo and "getting back home" for Dorothy. They both walked together past the shambled buildings of the Hub, along the brilliant yellow trail that cold take them where they needed to go. They went on along the yellow brick road.

Long past the health club and further up the walk, just beyond the viaduct they happened upon a scrap heap. Cars...and shells of cars were everyplace. Relics of both happy and sad times of families of individuals. Families and single folk; pleasant times and those distraught. Cars, empty shells of memory from short moments of life and lives. They were piled high in spots, somne beneath a crane, others parked just behind an idle building with the low brick wall of a compactor off the side. Leo stopped suddenly, checking a sound heard deep inside. "Wait." He tipped inside the open gateto hear a repeated creaking of metal worn to rust in its dis-use. "Ah-heh." A sort of muffled comment creaking still deeper inside the fenced area. "Ah heh heh." Leo called out, "Who's there?" Dorothy peeked behind him into the pile of rubble. She could only see the rust of torn metal, cold hard metal.

"I looked inside my own...", he gestured with his head, "...that old pickle over there. The others who were in the window with me are not there. I know that much! I haven't looked in many more but I saved them all... So's I can." Then after relaxing his expression a bit, "I don't have the heart!" Leo inserted a suggestion, "We're going to get what we need...why, you come along to get your heart! They probably got one there. Just what you need!" Dorothy agreed, "Yes, come along with us... We'll help you gain the heart for most anything." They helped him get to his feet and as he struggled to stand on his own, they cringed from the smell but supported him long enough for him to pull himself together. Within thirty minutes... A half hour, they were on their way past the piles of rust and bended metal. On their way back along the brilliant yellow trail. Past a sign reading the name of his prison...THE TIN CAN owner, JAMY HARTE. They were up and on their way to find the answer to all of their goals. A heart - for the 'TinMan', nerves - for Leo, and the way home for Dorothy. They were headed once again, up the yellow brick road; as they did, Dorothy looked for he familiar door in the distance. It was still shut. Still resembled the kitchen door but was still shut. Beyond that door was her family, her life. They plodded along up the yellow trail away from the scrap yard. In the near distance was a wooded area and across from that was the open field of an abandoned building. A monstrous structure. A building of glass and brick. Windows were broken where signs of anger showed a rock or bottle pitched through. Bricks were missing where decay had wasted the solid face. It no longer held the elegant restaurant it boasted - in name only - sprawled way above head. It no longer housed furniture or screening rooms, the lab or industry of long before. There were posted signs of progress but the true view revealed only decay. Birds flew in and out unhampered. Even a car could be seen passing through one section of a wall. Could be seen by anyone looking . The attention of the threesome was caught by shreds of paper blowing in the wind. The paper seemed to be blowing from inside someplace. From inside and out into the mainstream of their path. The building was off their trail. Off trail and therefore another hinderance to accomplishing ther goal. More paper blew. It flowed out of the building as though a great storm was brewing inside. A storm strong enough to cast words into the air as meaningless as the strips of paper which held them. Strips of words flew by crossing their path and catching on the shrubbery in the field... The wooded area across on the other side. Dorothy reached up to grab one sliver of paper and to read what news it had to present. "Deep inside...", it was unclear. She crossed to the opposite side of the trail, away from the darkness of the building ahead. In the wooded area many scraps lay attached to and under trees and low brush. She read another, "...except as we must be..." And another, "...nothing then, is there to stop us..." None of the messages meant much without a consistent thought. As she tried to reach for one last scrap of paper, she heard a funny tune carried by an even funnier voice..."Just for the hell of it...." It paused. She stood erect. Listening - half wanting to dash away, but waiting to see who or what made the comment. More loudly, the voice crept from under a low swung limb of a tree. "Just for the Hell of it! - I cried. Just for the hell of it! - I tried... Just for the HELL of it!" She dashed away now, as a short brown man, thin from what ailed him and gaunt as his attitude would leave him jumped from under the limb. As it grabbed for her she rolled away and it sang the more loudly, "JUST FOR THE HELL OF IT! I try!" It was obviously more irritated at her response to this attempt. Dorothy rejoined the others, wide eyed but sound minded and morealert. "I went the wrong way, let's look over there." The three stepped off and in the opposite direction; off the yellow brick road. Just inside the large hollow of the brick wall where even a car could pass, she and her companions saw an even stranger sight. A billboard of many words - a string of words...a poem. It was on a hill of dust or immersed within the rubble of progress. Progress stunted in its growth. As Dorothy read, the others listened. They listened to hear of the concern spent in this arena. Concern for loss of words and the mind with which to speak them. A gesturing sign hung high above on a metal beam. It read:

The Word Man

strips of words and letters

as wrought inside my mind,

are tucked into his inner soul...

his jacket did they line.

A scarecrow,

built of scrapped things

escarped surface shown...

the scarecrow...

man of little words

bespoken of the mind.

Produced the lines the women bore

erratic but sublime!

tackled like a tumble weed

amidst the taller shores,

the word man (he's a man of words)

sustains his everything.

A scarecrow,

built of anything

but integredation carries me

as far as his words comfort pleas

when desecration most profound...

hovers round

the SCARECROW

... just watch him get down!

~CC~ 10/98

Dorothy read it feeling sorry for the individual it referred to. This word man... Hidden from view. Hidden until now. He rested there in the lump of his existence. In the bag that he was, the residue of a man. He hung there on a post and beam joint below the sign. Hung there as seen someplace else in her distant memory. Hung alone and sobbing... "Chemical reactions...(sob)...y' give me those chemeecal-al reactions..." It was a scarecrow of a man, tall and thin. He was sallow looking. This scarecrow was muttering a tune about chemicals. "What's that?", Dorothy asked him. Leo spun the post around. "I get chemical reactions....You see, I get chemical reactions when I'm with you...", He broke into another croon right where he was.. They were reminded of tunes heard long ago someplace else; those tunes of melodious blue funk rhythm. She had seen this before. She remembered as he sang about chemicals... Nature and environmental issues of life.Remembered a similar character in some show or past life environment... A bouncing rag clothed man stuffed with useless words. Useless words because without someone to listen... Someone who cared to listen, his words fell upon deaf ears. This more current version of the "word man", a scarecrow of a thing - tall and thin, pale as almost any ghost out there was, was honking the same tune. Where the man was concerned with his own accomplishments before, this time the scarecrow seemed to be saying he was allergic to something. She listened a little more closely as he broke down, '... Oh uh oh uh.... Chemical reactions - it's just those cheme-e ca - al reactions!... There's all these cheme-e ca - al reactions when I come due... Ah-ooo ooo ooo!" As he whipped his scrawny body around on the pole to which he was mounted one arm came undone. The rope holding his wrist to the pole and his bagged and tattered up also fell loose onto the ground. She reasoned he was trying to tell them that chemical reactions - in his body or that in science - was blocking him up. Obviously a situation he preferred not to go through much longer. At the end of his performance on the pole Dorothy spoke up, "So how can you get away from them? ... These chemical reactions? " When she spoke he jerked his head from surprise. It was as if he had forgotten someone was there. When he jerked another rope fell looses and Leo reached over to clear those still binding him. He was free - unfettered. Turned loose to do whatever he needed so obviously to do. Still startled, he stumbled trying to stand, as he did, he almost fell into the Tin Man; stopping just before bumping him face to face. When he turned to keep from bumping the tin man, he fell again, this time almost bumping Ted Leo. He stopped just as their eyes met. Trying once more to stand up straight, the Word Man staggered into Dorothy almost knocking her over. He tried for what seemed like hours before he could stand on his own. Just as the TinMan let out one more loud belch, the man of words staggered in his direction. As Tin Man belched, Word Man caught full scent of the odor created. It pulled all confusion out of the word man's mind. "Thanks for the ...uh, smelling salts fella... Thanks a bunch.", He stepped away from the tin man and back toward the center of the group. Leaning on the pole which had held him captive. "So long have I been in this environment... This destruction, this attitude of abandonment... This nothingness of a world. So long have I been blocked into the decay of society... The rot of progress... The immoral amplitude of existence. Too long have I suffered the inhalation of pollution. So long have I been so dis - abled," he took a deep sigh, "Too long have I PAUSED here in the ruin of this DECAYED environment..." His thoughts were good but incomplete. He got hung up on his own words, his own train of thought. Tin Man spoke up catching an ounce of courage since being put down so abruptly for belching. "Say, you don't suppose those chem-e-cals can be used for anything do ya?" He paused, wiping his hand over his mouth to make himself more presentable. "Those chem- e- cals you talk about, if they is - uh, if they was strong enough to cause your abrasion"...he bucked his eyes wide for emphasis, "...then uh... Can't they get used to abrase somethin else?" Scarecrow jerked his head around again, this time to read the expression behind Tin Man's suggestion, "What do you mean?" Tin man shifted his weight for a more demostrattable pose, "I uh... I mean, if they cause you - one person...thing... So much interference; can't you use that ... Those interferred with?" He stopped for the scarecrow's response. Silence hung in the air between them. Not a sound could be heard for an extra five minutes while the idea was digested. They were unoblivious to the dark walls towering up and around them as they stood in the ruins of what had once housed a productive corporation. A corporate body - entire departments... Personnel and payroll, production and shipping - the entire corporation was gone leaving the hollow three story structure in which they stood. In this abyss, they took time to focus - standing upon a mound of time raised soil which had supported the weight of the word man for too many years. They stood here below the broken windows, the crumbled rafters and leaking remainer of a roof, contemplating the idea of using chemical reactions to interfere with what needed interferring with. Leo spoke first, "Determined interference... now that could be something!" The scarecrow rubbed his chin with thumb and forefinger in thought before losing his balance and whirling to the ground below him, landing in a seated position with both legs crossed, "You ... I see what you mean." He did not attempt to stand, rather he looked high up over his and their heads. He seemed to be looking for something. The entire corporation had deteriorated as had those in the area around it while he grappled for words. Words to correct and bonify relationships and issues. The words which if used in the proper tone and situation could well have procured... Could have saved HIS and those who lingered around him a crisis as they now endured. "I am only a man of words. Stuffed full of conjoined letters that mean nothing . Nothing especially because I nave not exhibited the brain necessary to USE them to any benefit." He muttered to himself but at a level for them to hear.

Before he could speak again, Dorothy culled him out of his disillusion of total failure, "You know... There really isn't anything here. There's nothing left here now... For anyone." They all looked around at the dark and dismal space inside the old corporate building. A ray or two of sunlight filtered through from the outside, but even that only highlighted the destruction of the society once held by the structure in which they stood. Dorothy continued, "There's nothing... No one here to hear or use your words. They won't do a bit of good unless there is a ... An audience; someone who wants to hear. Then maybe you can use your brain!" She paused. Tin man spoke up, "Yeah man, you may as well go with us. No need to stand in the middle of all this nothing! I'm going to get the heart ..." Leo cut him off, "...And I'm going to get the nerve for ...." Dorothy cut in, "Just come on along. I'm sure you'll feel better about yourself and maybe we can even help you get your words together." She looked pitifully at Leo and the Tin man. They were each already in a different frame of mind than when she had found them. They helped him to his feet. When they did, he joined them arm-in-arm as they returned to the yellow brick road. They traveled a distance sharing exerpts from their lives in explanation why they neede the very items they were going to collect. Why the scarecrow was in need of a brain. Why the tin man was in desperation for a heart and what was driving Ted Leo after courage. Only Dorothy was the after the intangible. She was looking for "...Home."

As she relayed her problem to the group they each sought to comfort her as she had them. "Home is where the heart is..." "If you have the courage... Anything is available!" "If you just think long and hard enough - wish upon it - it will happen for you!" Each one could see an easy solution to her problem. Each saw the simplicity of the answer for her, but not for themselves.

As they moved along through the cityscape, they never noticed that they were being watched. High in the open, above everything, unseen but yet existent; BIG BROTHER was taking in every word. Big brother could see and hear everything done and said. He knew their weakness and where they were going to remedy them. He saw what lurked in the dark spaces and knew those that lingered among the low. Big Brother was just an arm's length away but his presence was unknown to the travelers. In watching them, he had learned of Dorothy's need. And in knowing her need knew also that she was not like the others. She was different. As he watched from above he had seen her quick resolve... Her spontaneous answers for everything. He observed her self-control and focus. She seemed to be self assured and that was not a trait held by anyone in this land. He had seen her often clutch at an amulet which dangled from her wrist. On the amulet was a small red item. The item resembled slippers. Small red slippers dangled from a chain fastened at the ends by a small gold clip. They were of gold lacquered in red enamel with a diamond stud in the toe of each shoe. It was obviously this pair of slippers that gave her the special skill of being confident. Even without her newly gained trio, Dorothy stood out as an independent. Her independence was something anyone, especially one of his grand elevation, should covet... Covet and more gratuitously, possess. As Big Brother took time to lay his plan, the group of hopefuls proceeded along the trail. As they proceeded, they did not notice the darkness which had gathered above them. High on power extended to them from the dark witch, a flight wing of brass monkies seated in antagonizing speed carts of relic proportions... The earliest version of the vehicle...circled in the distance. As they circled, the troupe chatted on in their excitement about finding their individual goals. It was a beautiful day and they were enjoying the breadth of it. The menagerie of birds and flowers, the scent of fresh growing herbs... Some of which they, not even Dorothy, could define. It was indeed a beautiful day. In the clear blueness of the skies above, the heavens revealed not one cloud to distort their pattern of happiness. Not one blemish revealed itself in the day's progress, not until they caught glimpse of one brass monkey. The brass monkey that lingered too long on the trail adjacent to theirs. The trail that ran along side them under cover of the Kick-A-Poo Woods. If the glimpse of a brass monkey did not wilt the field of flowers about them - the stench did. And brass monkies do kick up quite a stench. They were known to kick up such a stench near the Kick-A-Poo Woods that none who lived in the region would travel the land without a mask. A mask to filter the air. Those who dwelled within the land of the HUB knew all too well of the stench a brass monkey can bring, they stayed away. Dorothy and her troupe knew nothing of the threat. As he passed them, the lingering brass monkey spun wide throwing his scent across the field of daisies and well beyond the yellow brick road clear to the opposite side. In the fraction of time it took for the group to regain their breath of fresh air, the other monkies were upon them. With only a small struggle, the members of the traveling group... Dorothy, Tin Man, the Scarecrow and Ted Leo were snatched up and hauled away to the Monkey's lair.

The nead monkey in charge presented them in their insecurity to none other than the dark witch. Now the dark witch, 'Livia, ruled the dark region. In her world everything revealed the image of dark evil. Dark evil was two steps beyond mid-evil... And we've all heard of that. As head monkey mouthed his prize catch as a presentation for the dark witch, Dorothy looked around the great hall taking in all she could see. There were catacmbs everywhere. Portholes from above revealed light from the heavens but even that could not lighten the air inside. What she could see inside the closest rooms of the catacombs were great mis-shapen images doing much of nothing. They lay casually drumming their fingers or tearing dry skin from their lips or biting their own fingernails. They fingered their noses and twirled strands of the hair on their heads about one or more fingers. It seemed as if they were bored. The walls were of greyed over masses riddled from time wasted and not spent on repairs or decor of the environment. The air was itself heavy enough to imprison one who struggled to breath... And breathing is a sign of life. Life here was stagnating - boredom idle time and suffocation of ideas were the ultimate of height in the world ran by the dark witch - Olivia. There was little food to be eaten, as seen on the platters around them. The laundry facility provided and in easy view from the main standing area, was of obvious minimum use. Their large hides were cloaked in dingy grey soiled tatters of cloth. Dust balls blew with the slightest movement of anyone or anything passing across the floor; and as Olivia walked, so the dust balls blew. They tumbled like miniature tumbleweeds.

"What have we here?..Monkey." She brushed past Dorothy leering at her with eyes trailing up and down the length of the would be college girl before her. "What is this...relic or remedy?" Sarcasm flew with every word. "Is this supposed to be a joke on my existence or an insult to my facade? She circled until she noticed the pair of slippers. "What a pretty...we have here - lovely child..." She paused to sigh while reaching to cupthe slippers in the curve of her fingers. When she did, she jerked away as they mad e her fingers burn. They stung the skin they touched causing a stinging pain. "Oh!... Pretty but naughty are we! We'll just see about that!" With a wave of her arm, She dashed away swinging her cotton skirts of many layers and with what seemed like endless revelationsof knees away from Dorothy. She dashed away back to her throne. As she whirled to sit, she pulled the podium (attached at the side) down in front of her so that she could lean an elbow for thought. From beneath a deep furrowed frown Olivia bellowed, "Take them out of my sight. Put them in a cubicle of the catacomb!" Then, as if suddenly remembering, "No! Wait! I want those slippers! Take them off!" As she finished giving orders, the monkies and others inside the chambers sat up. There had never been a fee before. No requirement was demended for anything...for doing nothing. There was no charge to be given nothing to do. There was no charge and nothing received...they were all doing well at doing their nothing. Why now, at the introduction of this WOULD BE was there a change! "Hold her," Olivia yelled again. "Remove her slippers!" Head monkey in charge lunged for Dorothy only to meet Ted Leo's knuckled fist. The monkey's lunge left the cart unguarded and the trio jumped into it. It was the best option for escape. The Tin Man, who knew more about machines struggled to control it as the word man fumbled for a rebuking comment. In all of their excitement, none of them noticed the door outside closing. The trickle of the still waterfall revealed another exit. As the monkey brigade closed in around them, Tin Man smashed through the grates at the waterfall carrying them beyond the limits of Olivia's world. Scrambling through the broken peices, the brigade soon lost the group to the outside world. "Darnn! Now we'll have to explain this!" Head monkey turned his engine off and the others did the same.

Not long after they had broken free of the stench holding them in the realm of the dark witch, Tin Man blew a sigh of relief. "I actually got us oout of there - could you believe it! I didn't think I could get it... Not since... Well you know! - let's go." Back at the yellow brick road on the trail to the solution of life, the travelled on in the direction of what appeared to be Dorothy's kitchen door. When they arrived, it turned out to be the back door of the Emerald City. Dorothy stood to raise the heavy knocker mounted at the center of the door. "Where are we?" She had not noticed any tell tale marks which could define their location. "The Emerald city is not a WHERE but THE PLACE to be." The face in the door looked around at those outside, "...and who are you?" The word man attempted to speak up, "We are seking an answer..." The face interrupted, "Answer?... Then you need A Wiz. Do you have an appointment? Why are you at the back door and not the front door... Like everyone else? The others... That is anyone else would use the front door, just to be proper." He paused to catch his breath, watch for their response and to give his words time to effect the mind. When he did, Scarecrow - the word man - shrank back for their error then stepped out in front of his companions looking around at each before saying anything. He spoke, "If we may, could we then request an audience with the Wiz? It is really short notice but of relative emergency..." He cut his question short. His words were supported by an elegant stance. He had placed one foot before the other, perpendicular... As seen in many a ballet. His hand was placed before him at chest level with the other tucked behind. It impressed the doorman. "Yes, I think I can arrange that for one so dandy as you.. One moment please." The face removed itself from the door's window only to return briefly. With a wink, the doorman opened the rear door to escort unexpected guests through the hall and to the great foyer. There, the announcement of their request was forwarded to the great room. They were held for what seemed like forever while the Wiz prepared himself for the short notice meeting. It was an elaborate space about them. All manner of personalities sauntered about each demonstrating his or her own regal attire. There were who and what appeared to be Kings and Queens of anywhere. The African Nile and River Jordan... The Morroccan and even what must have been the ArabEmirate. They could see jewelry and finery of the Ivory Coast...a man dripping of pearls, gold and diamonds - a Lebanese. What must have been a Ghananian in his royal King's throne of ebony was carried on shoulder by the seat. There came relic of Tunisian display in scarlet red and opals with silver studs. They were multi-hued faces but understandably inter related. Just as Dorothy began to tire from counting and identifying the varieties before them, the great door opened. They were beckoned inside and through a long corridor. A door at the end of the corridor revealed a smaller room with a massive blue screen. Soon after entering the room, they were blasted with sound, a roaring entry for the voice that ordered them, "... Kneel!" The Tin Man fell to his knees and ted Leo followed. Scarecrow started to speak, one finger raised to attention. When a second bellow was let out, he also fell to his knees. Dorothy knelt on one knee and awaited consultation. When an image appeared she spoke, "Your greatness, we are here for your wise assistance." The image was a blur. No distinct features revealed themselves but the voice was consistently loud and authoritative. "And who then are YOU?" Dorothy replied, "I am lost away from home... I am displaced and confused... I am bringing these others who seek your wisdom. I am Dorothy. Silence fell across the room as they waited for wise words of response. When it spoke again, the image of what must have ben the OZARD one showed more clearly. "And what purpose do I hold this audience with you - Dorothy?" She reponded, "I want to go home." The image flickered across the screen as though overwhelmed with the response, "Home?" He seemed nto not understand her wnating to be anyplace other than OZ land. She spoke again, "But you are a great Wiz - a most knowing and powerful WIZ... Can't you tell me how to get there?" After a mmoment, he responded in a final tone, "You return the way you came." And the screen began to fade. Scarecrow leaped to his feet, "But what about me!? I need a brain!!" HIs outstretched arm seemed to cull the image and bellowing voice to return. "What is this!?" Scarecrow repeated his plight and the other two followed standing in the demands. "I need my nerve," from Ted Leo; and, "For me - a heart!" Echoed the Tin Man. This angered the wiz as wise as he was. "Then go to get for me the brass control of the evil witch Olivia. The HANDLE... The brass clutch she holds, and I will see to it you get your needs fulfilled. - Now Be gone!!" Sound and image disappeared leaving them in a hollow where even the slightest movement caused echoes. Out of the room and back through the hall, they toyed with a corrected version of their presentation. It had gone all wrong. "It wasn't supposed to go that way..." "For sure we were not rude - huh?" ..."Perhaps a little less frustration..." "...and more decorum?" "Yes." "I think that's what was missing." In their conglamorate of conversation the trip though the great hall and out the door came more quickly than imagined. They were directed out the front door by a different doorman. Out the front door and out of reach of the little vehicle which had brought them so easily to the back door from a distance. They were outside now and headed back along the yellow brick road with a more immediate goal. They would return with the witch's brass knuckles! They walked the trail with more determination now - they walked with a vengeance.

Olivia's monkies were on the prowl as usual, their stench mouth curling the very petals of the daisies and day lilies of the fields. They scouted for what was unusual in the scenario. They hunted the unforeseen and stalked the unprepared that ventured into, onto and across the land. As they did, the head monkey was alerted to the movement of the "one with slippers." Reminded of his embarrassment at letting them escape the first time, he stayed his response for a better plan of capture. As the scouts kept watch on Dorothy and her trio, the leader arranged his plan. Up ahead the road took a slight bend at a creekside just inside a wooded area. As it bent, the small troupe of travelers paused to take a moment's rest. At the creek, Ted Leo and Dorothy quenched a light thirst while Tin Man hit a bit of oil and the word man rested weary knees. A slight breeze blew scent of what resembled forest freshness but soon turned foul for something wicked in the air. Wicked and close upon them. Still standing at the waters edge, dorothy turned in time to be snatched up and away by the head monkey who pumped more speed into his engine to avoid interference by her companions...this time. He flicked his fingers in signal to those at the last end of the line of ambush to tie and haul the others also. Everything was quick, to the point and without hesitation...this time. They took easy prey with them back into the stench of the badlands where they lived. Witch Olivia was known to rule nothing outside the bad lands. As they roared through the double doors of the abandoned mall of Olivia's world, images of those inside blurred past. Wild haired overweight and disheveled dress shouted the disorder of the land. In the middle of this disorder and foul odor stood the reintroduction of the heavy hipped dark woman, Olivia. She ordered them immediately put to test. Brass monkey, the head monkey in charge, followed his orders as given. Pulling the girl off his vehicle, he shoved her into a nearby stockade. The stockade was in itself an antique, a relic of what had existed before her time. It was itself a representation of forced labor and control of individuality. After mounting the restraint, he reached for her slippers. As he reached, Dorothy could hear the clang of nearby similar constraints being placed upon her companions." "Too long have you been free to beligerance!" Then, "Be shut with this!" Olivia was indeed in control. From her limited range of vision, Dorothy could see a crowd gathering from their amazement at this new requirement. As they gathered, they muttered among themselves to resolve the cause for all ththis. In the crowd was one who appeared familiar...familiarly resembling the image of the one who was a wiz. As she noticed the face among the crowd, she heard the distraction of a final harness. The straw man, the man-of-words was at last to be mounted. As we all know, any stuffed item...man or woman, animate or inanimate is something that needs be handled with a gentle hand. Anyone with half a mind of his own KNOWS not to rough handle what is fragile. The man of words was. A brass monkey ripped off arm and them portions of a torso in his attempt at placing him...this bundle of words...in restriction. In his true existence, his true nature - now the Word Man found his mind. "STOP! This is too far! ...gone far enough!" His loose portions lay strewn accross the path of on lookers. They gawked in expectation of the next rise of emotion and it brought his ego to an all new higher level never, in all these recent days, had he amassed such an audience. He spoke out again, even amid his own ruination. He spoke with clarity and determination, "Stop the madness - we have done nothing to appease you...nothing to disenfranchise you and nothing to distract you from you or yours. Why is it", he paused for effect gazing up at the crowd gathered around him, "Why is it that you persist with your persecution of my friends and I. Is it your nature? Is this your custom? Or is it simply that there is some great need you have within yourself? What is it Msss....?" Olivia was dumbfounded. No one had challenged her rationale especially here in her world where her word was the bible. The evil Olivia bounced over to the platform where the brass monkey was attempting to put brackets upon the fragile and broken man. Looking at him in his disproportioned state, she shook her head searching for the next command. He would not be easy to contain. To save face in this rebuttal she threw uncertain words back at him, "Mr.Whatever you are, I will deal with you in earnesty. You are indeed a different sort. Take him over there!" The monkey scooped him up and carried the armload over to her benching area. The benching area of the do nothing room was rarely used for anything more than standing room. Standing room for an audience that would do nothing in the face of one more innocent being made into a mindless wad of existence for the evil Olivia's control. There are good and there are bad controls to exist under. The good are usually those that compliment life and the environment around it. The good are those that allow life in spite of life's continuation. The good are those that allow a feeling of satisfaction in the everyday's completion of existence. None of that was evident once entering the world of Olivia. In the world of Olivia, will was bent by constant pressure. It was her intent to extract the essence of self determination and self pride of any thing that entered her realm. It was her focus for her personal enjoyment to see to it that none kept his...her ...or its own mind for anything. Everyone thing that was in her presence was there under infliction of her control. Everyone thing relinquished as much as the soul to exist in this darkness. They relinquished every mindful thing but were unmindful of their situation because they were under her control ...even in their mind. Those from the catacombs gathered for the excitement of another distortion about to happen. As the scarecrow looked helplessly out across the gathering, he saw nothing but disarray. There were mishapen images of varying shades of darkness in the dark. Unkept hair and soiled disheveled tatters of what would be clothing of much the same hue blinded his vision. It was becoming impossible to think... To reason with his aggressor. The monkey was gripping him tightly and with the missing portions of what was himself unattached, he was growing numb. He felt the monkey leap onto some elevated item and in his spinning around, the view of Dorothy and his other companions returned before the scarecrow's eyes. He could not think but saw the expressions of terror on their faces. Just then he felt another tear in his extremities. The tear was crossed by a cool breeze or a chill, he could not determine the source of sudden coolness but saw more of his stuffing blow across the floor and towards the crowd. As the monkey slammed his to the ground, Olivia started to speak again. "Now everyone of you lilly livered mothers...even you fathers," she glared around the room at the undetectable male and female images littering the floor, "...pay attention so that you remember! It happened here. It happened to you and to those among you! It will happen again if you disobey! He...this one, is out of line! He..." She corrected herself, "...It will learn, like you have learned, to do right by me!" She sashayed across the floor toward the platform in the staging area. "Now brass monkey! Do way with him...it!" As she continued to walk and brass monkey attempted to grasp the most important peice of scarecrow. Brass monkey searched frantically trying to maintain a timely destruction of this thing for Olivia's desired effect. As they played their role toward destruction of the thing, a voice in the audience was heard over the silence. "The sands of time are always running..." The sound distracted monkey, causing him to look out into the audience. The voice continued, "...and when a wrong is done, the time for punishment is approach..." In the cluster of bodies near the voice, there was a rustle. Another strip of scarecrow's filling had been picked up, "Know ye, therefore, that there is no god but ALLAH..." An ' aw ' went over the audience. Faces turned to look at faces. Bodies bent to retrieve words and thoughts of the thing on stage so that they could hear for themselves. Another voice read, "Those who believe say, "Why is not a prayer sent down for us...but when it is revealed and fighting is mentioned.... Thou will see in whom the heart is a disease." Faces turned to look up and across the crowd at Olivia. "God?... Allah? Is not this world under the god Olivia?" Olivia bellowed, "Go on with the show!" Monkey looked into the audience to hear more words, beginning to remember similar words from the outside world in his life before Olivia. Olivia was almost through the masses that had gathered for this destruction of the thing that had defied her. Dorothy screamed out from her compromising position, "And what did the words say!? Read to me once more...I did not hear you!" Without thinking, another voice read the words in hand, "...His mercy on us - yet who can deliver the unbeleivers from chastisement?" Dorothy spoke again, "That's what I thought you said, why are you letting them do this to you No one will deliver what is not worthy of delivering!" The thing seemed to be filled with religion. Brass monkey dropped his load, "Yeah! I remember now! We were captured for control." As he ended his last line, the crowd closed in around Olivia. As it did, she cringed for disbelief of the situation. They had never returned to thought before. What manner of thing was this whatever she had on stage now? "I am ..." She did not finish her line. They turned on her with the wrath that she had delivered upon them. Their numbers were intense and the spell she had placed for their control... For the management of mind, fell away with the use of what each contained as his own mind. As some continued to read, others laid hands on the oppressor in their midst. As they laid on hands, they were relieved of the ugly appearance of mindless existence that had imprisoned them. "Woe to them that hath made him...us reject ALLAH." Across the crowd read another, "So they taste the evil result of their conduct..." Olivia appeared above the masses, passed along toward the staging area as so many of them had been before. She could not control her direction for the rush below her. She was soon at the edge of the stage where scarecrow was being brushed off by the monkey and repacked by the masses. Another reading caused her to be tossed upon the stage where even the brass monkey of her ultimate control fastened her so quickly into the harness she had arranged that even he could not see the blur of his performance. "When the event inevitable cometh to pass, then will no soul deny its coming.... Many will it bring low, many will it exalt...When the earth shall be shaken apart....and the mountains crumbled to atoms...and become dust scattered about." Just then Dorothy leaped onto the stage touching the hand of the evil Olivia, "Wait!" Olivia immediately began to wither into a powder that settled upon the stage before them. Dorothy clasped her mouth in shock. She had attempted to stop the obvious from happening. Olivia had strong allergy to the good that would exist. She was destroyed. The ashes of her existence lay at Dorothy's feet. As the audience gathered around to see what had been done, the natural being of individuality began to return to each. The duplicated garb fell away from their bodies revealing the unique physique of each one. The hair of disarray fell to an orderly shape around keen faces of realization.They became what they once were, individuals. Scarecrow stood to read from his own contents, "The old physical world will disappear in the new creation."

Suddenly, the darkness of the Olivia's world was hit with a breeze that blew across the staging room and down into the catacombs sweeping the dust and odor with it as it travelled. The darkeness that had cloaked the area was peirced by new flecks of light that soon tore away the shadows that had dimmed the eyes and minds of those held inside. The monkey on stage and those across the way took on a whole new appearance, that of their extended being. As the brass monkey on stage began to stand erect, the masses on the floor before him evolved into their own correctness. What nature had originally designed proved forth. They turned into human beings. For the first time, they saw what created a smile upon the faces of each and every one. For the first time since their unity in this, Olivia's world, they were free to think on their own. It was cause for celebration. As the catacombs continued to fall away from view...the dirtied and stale coverlets which had shielded them from the chill in the dark, the glass like walls which had disallowed their individual privacies... They danced for excitement and relief. Dorothy looked down at the ashes in front of her, "She may have changed too." Another reading, this time by Leo, "And ye shall be sorted out into three classes...the companion of the right hand...the companions of the left hand... And the foremost, those nearest to Allah..." He continued, "...and there will be companions with big and beautiful lustrous eyes!" His face lit up now, remembering what he was doing at the weight room. "...Eyes like unto pearls, well guarded, a reward for deeds of their past life." Ted Leo recalled his nervousness about entering the weight room. He had seen someone there that lit up his heart and mind with all the intentions of a hello, but choked off the advance with lack of nerve. "Dorothy, I think we need to get going!" "Yes, you are right, we do need to get going, I need to get home." She looked around for what the Wiz had requested, the brass handle of the staff that Olivia had walked with. The staff she had brandished with all her fury at these people who now danced with ease... alleviation from their most current life. Her staff, her walking stick, the brass topped cane. In her demise, it had rolled just out of the ash. Dorothy bent to pick it up. When she touched it, the dust that was Olivia blew into a collected stream and rolled across stage and out of the room. Olivia was gone.The light broke full force into their world now allowing them to see themselves and what nature had given them outside of manipulation to be and exist within. In the forested area that had shrouded their world there sprang readily visible trees and bushes bearing fruit and plenty to eat. It was as if they had not seen or could not see it before. Their eyes revealed new things to them because they were in a new mind. A mind where they could think without being pressurized.

As Dorothy and her companions prepared to leave, the head monkey hosted them to the edge of their world and back onto the yellow brick road. This had been the most enlightening visit ever to the dark realm of Oz.

"Go away, can't you see that I am just a man. Just a man with pain like you. Just a man with aner and frustrations. I am just a man with dreams that no longer exist. Are you blind that you can not see to realize what your own eyes reveal before you?" Dorothy looked down at him as did the other three. They looked with disbelief. The audacity of this would be wizard of a man. 'You had us go back to the land of Olivia...put our lives in danger, risk being lost in that wilderness, and you don't think you can do anything!?" She took a deep breath to continue as Leo rared back a fisted hand ready to pummel him, "No Leo", Dorothy continued, "what on earth was the brass handle for? More decoration of this..." She glanced around the cluttered room, "...box of yours?" "How long does a man sit within a closet while the world exists...passes by? How long have you ...don't even answer that...How long did you expect to pretend about life? Pretending is a child's game. To face life, the reality of life...to live life as a man, you have to face it as a man. WALK LIKE A MAN." Her frustration was readily apparent, as her arms flailed in the open space around her straining to be heard. He had let her down. A wiz, and he was nothing. Could do and would do nothing to resolve the crisis that had developed for her and the poor souls with her. He had gained their confidence, put them at risk and now professed his inability of performance. He had simply stated he could not do anything. She sought inside herself to aid the dilemas. As she searched she spoke to her companions.

"Scarecrow, you have had the best time of your life... And I am sure, have realized that the words stored inside of you were the words of God himself ... Many times, they were what spared even us the pain and agony of an adversary. It takes brains to create words and brains to use them in a way that will not hurt or in a way that will encourage ease of communication. You have always had a brain." She stepped a few paces until she stood face to face with Ted Leo. Clasping his paw, she spoke gently to him, remembering his gallantry in every threatening situation. Remembereing his comical strut at their first encounter. "Leo, you wanted courage. You said you needed courage to go inside a club. A club that holds only people like yourself. The people inside that door are only people like yourself...people who are looking for strength, people who enjoy the same things you do; exercise. They are not there because of courage, it takes courage to do the things you have done since this adventure. You stood up against every one or thing that came as a threat to your companions and to what you felt was right. You fought off the monkies and even chased the gityegotyeman away. It has taken courage to go with me this far. You have always been a being of courage." Leo sighed heavily as a look of complacency, deep relief came over his face. Dorothy stepped away and over to the Tin Man. The man of metal seemed to have shed his metallic surface since first their first meeting at the scrap yard. "Tin Man." She smiled, remembering the terror stricken expressions crowding his features in the darkness of the scrapyard. She recalled his need for oil at ever admission of existence. His need for oil had lessened over this trip. She could not recall the last time he had even so much as looked for it, he had become more human. "Tin Man, poor Tin Man. You have struggled within yourself for all of many years. You have struggled to avoid what was already done. It takes a heart full of compassion to rescue the many you have pulled to freedom over the years since your error. It takes a very big heart to make space for those who had no place to go. It took a great deal of HEART...compassion and understanding to pull yourself up and out in search of a better relationship within society. If you do not have heart ...my dear Mr. Harte...then who does? I believe you have always had the heart, you just needed to realize it within yourself." As she stepped back and away from the Tin Man, she gazed at each of her companions. A sigh for their realized hopes rang heavy from her chest. A deep sigh and then regained frustration for her own situation, one less easily resolved. She gazed at them and remembered a day long ago when she had come to this stage of departure. The departure always arrived, but Toto was there. The departure arrived, but the Wiz was a better sort of wiz. There had always been a solution. There had always been an option out of her situation. This time, the wiz was not even the shell of her earlier assumptions. The wiz that once was was not. As she formed her lips to speak, a tear formed in her eye. "And now, for me, as for me...I would wish for home. Home is a great distance away and in all of our travels, despite your bravery...Leo, even with your compassion Tin Man, and your intelligence Scarecrow, I am afraid that home is more intangible than ever. I had so hoped that the trip would be one of ease since finding a Wiz at everything. I had so hoped that all would become a lighter burden, less to contend with in his prescence. A wiz is sometimes what we need to release our own despair. A wiz or at least someone to lighten our load...help us work through the menagerie of our own existence. Home for me, I'm afraid, is too very far away. It is no place near this Oz." Dorothy sighed heavily. Each of her companions looked helplessly at her and then at each other. Never had they realized that a home could mean so much. They had always considered home to be where ever they were. Tin Man had simply made camp where he had landed at the conclusion of his pickle enlistment. Scarecrow had remained on the fringes of the society where he was known and that he had known. Ted Leo was never far from the door of his greatest antagonism. To them, they had always been at home. Dorothy felt as though she would never return to the familiar spaces she called home. The place in which she could grow to her own expectations. The place familiar to her. Just then, she recalled the good witch from her past experiences with Oz. The good witch had not appeared in this entire tour of Oz. She had been the one good thing, the reliable thing in the world of Oz. Where was she? For certain she could not have given up. She could not have died, good is never supposed to die. It should never fade. Good is always the one thing that prevails. Where was the good witch? She found her tongue to ask her companions... "Has anyone seen the good witch?" They looked again, one at the other, all shaking their heads from side to side. They had not.The one who would have been a wiz spoke now, "Why she...she's passed on." Dorothy looked at him with disbelief. "How? Glenda...passed on?" The Wiz explained to the group about age and determination. He explained that Glenda had existed for centuries in the world of Oz when it was surrounded by good. She had been the one thing that reassured those in a world of doubt. She was the pillar of strength that bolstered life between the heavens and in the world. The world of Oz... The only world that many knew, had been without Glenda for a long time. Glenda had gone home. Her family, those closest to her, had held a gathering to see her off. She was gone. She was often mentioned with fondness, but it was not the same as her radiant appearance in their time of need. She had been like an angel, a good angel that could lift even the most confused of minds back into a functional level of consciousness. "She has been gone now for almost a decade." A lump caught in her throat as Dorothy remembered the blue light hovering above her sometimes as feint as the north star at it's first appearance in the night sky. She recalled the light airy tones that rang across the heavens as she spoke and the gentle breeze that brushed her skin as Glenda touched her and must have touched others in demonstration of a cause. She caught the little red slippers that dangled at the end of her bracelet. As she looked down at them now, she could almost hear Glenda singing once again. From some place deep in her memory, Dorothy could hear the encouraging words of Glenda's song telling her to look to the future... To the positive...toward the good, and always remember to look to God in times of weakness. She smiled in spite of the tears that had swelled in the corners of her eyes. The one who would be a wiz spoke up again as though he had suddenly remembered himself. "I have an idea!" He jumped to his feet leaving the sleeping mat that had cradled his shiftless sham for their entire visit and probably before their arrival or return. He jumped to his feet now with a new outlook for progress. "I have something saved for my own escape... I mean my own return to sanity!" "Stay here!" He dashed off and into an adjoining room. From behind the walls they could hear clanging and swooshing of things being tossed about. Moments later he reappeared with a large key. A key of metallic appearance...brass or bronze. "This will help you ...us get you home. It is the key to many cities of the world." Tilting it slightly he read the engraved message on the side. "For presidents only...", then glancing back up at them briefly, remarked; "I was given this by the collection of competitors. I was chosen as the best among them for a connection. I had forgotten it existed. It should allow me... Let's see here (he read again)...key to cities of the world. Useable by any man gifted with political prominence and philandery." Dorothy was elated. "Of course! That definitely sounds like you!" He rushed to her side beaming, almost dropping his key in the excitement of a new opportunity, " And now I will get you homeward bound. Call the doorman!" With more confidence, he sauntered across the room now shutting down the whizzing computers used for his Ozzard display. "I won't be needing these. These computers are archaic... Aren't they." Without waiting for an answer, he pulled the mouthpeice of a great horn... An earhorn of sorts... To order the doorman into a rush. "The man has to be reminded ever so often you know, I ...we'll have to continue the exhuberance into this departure... They expect it you know. A wiz is always prompt and something of great a impression... We have to keep that for them." Again he dashed across the room, this time to a massive blue drape suspended from the rafters high above. He pulled a rod, walking as he did, to expose a great basket. On the side was a swatch that read - from Latifah's ...to you - and many strings that seemed to wind together as they stretched up into the rafters. "I don't understand!" Dorothy screamed at him, "What is this?" He didn't bother to stop his activity but yelled over his shoulder, "It is the way out of now way! I don't believe I stayed... Waited this long to tell you. We will be departing very shortly." He tied a long braided ribbon from the side of the basket to a beam in the middle of the room. "I suggest you get yourself prepared!" He dashed over to a large tank in a far corner of the room. As he flipped a valve on the tank he remembered something else and yelled, "I can't take all of you, only the one who needs most to get home! It is a limited journey!" Dorothy turned to her companions as a wiz continued running around the room gathering his odd belongings tossing them into the basket. 'Well, I guess this is worth the effort. Nothing else seems to be coming along, I will miss you all. Leo..." , he smiled as she caressed the whiskers hanging at the corner of his mouth "...You get in that door, you hear!They aren't any different than you in there." Tin Man stepped up to hug her, "I'll miss ya Dorothy. I haven't even needed the oil since you came around. I didn't know I had it in me! ...I had it all the time." "I know, Tin Man... Stand up for your convictions, you can never go back... So take heart and do the right thing the first time around... Be strong of heart won't you?" She dabbed at her eye for the thought of terror he had subjected himself to over the years of hiding. He was a better man now, for sure. She turned to the straw man. He was the one who had doubted himself most of all. It took only the time and confidence to speak his mind...his heart... What was inside him all along. "Scarecrow, you don't have to be a strawman, you know; you can be a leader among men. You have what it takes... You have only to use it for self and betterment of mankind. Words are useful only when used. And the words you have inside are all good." She hugged him causing a few more lines to fall around him. He quickly scooped them up, reading ; "...do as the men of faith, and believe in Allah..." "..Know... That thou hast neither dominion nor helper without Allah..." With little thought for digestion of his lines,the others joined him as they all spoke together, "We will miss you Dorothy, Oz will miss you."

As they finished their goodbyes, the great wall fell away revealing the masses that were the land of the wiz. They were watching as he stepped into the basket himself announcing this greatest charity, delivering Dorothy to a home. "My greatest feat ever, and I doubt that even I can return from the great beyond, is about to take place. As I came in the beginning, I shall depart into the heavens, but to deliver... To attempt to deliver, this young woman that has come before me looking for a home. I will do what has been most impossible. If ever it has been possible in the world of Oz, I will deliver her. In my absence, I pray that the good life you have learned here in Oz shall continue. I shall continue to pray that the every good shall remain. And I shall pray for our successful event. On that note, I bid you all Adeux!

The doorman cut the great ribbon tied at the side. And the basket gripped by many ribbons extended from above began to lift itself. The sudden movement caused dorothy to startle and fall off the rim of the basket she had only begun to step inside of. "Wait!" "She's not all there!" The spectators yelled from below. "Catch her Wiz!" He stood there in the basket holding the ropes and ties that were placed for guiding their direction into the heavens. "I can't let these go!" The rafters high above were metal beams of a factory closed long ago. The metal beams which had rusted away and now exposed the sky well above and outside of the gathering, could shred anything that so much as brushed the edge of them. As Dorothy dangled outside the basket saved only by one of the many ribbons tied to the outside, the crowd watched in terror. The basket lifted almost to the craggiest of beams sure to tear Dorothy or the gas filled balloons to peices with the slightest movement. With a last minute wiz of an idea, the one inside the basket stepped toward Dorothy's dangling ribbon causing the basket to tilt and sending her cascading down and below the basket itself. As she slid, she barely cleared the lowest of rafters. She swung in mid air suspended only by the yellow ribbon tied to the outside of the basket that was to take her home. When the basket cleared the last beam, she felt the platform above her shift again from the weight of the man inside. She would not be torn to shreds but was now too high above the crowds to get down. Ted Leo was too far below her to help her this time, she would have to do it herself or rely upon the man in the basket overhead. "Wiz!?... Are you up there?" He said nothing. In his absence of response, she realized she was on her own. He would have left without her in his rush. If she got home...safely, or got there at all, she would have to do it herself. He must have been up there but he would not...was not going to help. Getting home was up to her alone. She was on her own.

Going home -

The Wiz was leaving with or without her. He had seemed to be concerned for her interests, concerned for the promises made in their verbal contract. He, until now, had held his place of reverence within her mind for those promises made. Until now... This point of her weakness, the moment of her greatest need; a wiz had been the answer to her prayers. A wiz that was coincidental to her demise. She vaguely recalled the terror on the face of the buppy dog next door. Vaguely did she recall the dinner table and a meal. Dangling at the ends of the yellow rope that held her only a few feet from the wiz that was, Dorothy slipped in and out of conscious reality and the world of Oz. He did not extend a hand but leaned at the opposite side of the basket to which she clung. He did not pull her rope in any direction and was obviously of no intention of her continued existence. The wiz that had resolved the solution to her current announced dilema of reaching home, simply watched as the would be college girl fought for her own existence. Words and images flew rampantly through her mind. "What purpose is there to having or knowing this wiz?" She struggled with her internal realization that the wiz was nothing other than a weak and struggling individual as many of those had met in Oz. Hanging high above that world now, suspended by a jute rope provided by him, Dorothy's mind reeled with images of Oz and memories of her home. Her life was at its most critical stage now. There had to be quick resolution. She began to struggle up the rope toward the useless image of the wiz. Her eyes drew a blur in her mind; a blur of people and things most dear to her. Despite the blur, these were the things that gave her the motivation to continue the fight for survival. As she scrambled up and over the edge, she opened eyes to realize it was her bed. It was her bed and not the basket of empty dreams. The basket of empty hopes evolved into the reality of her existence. She climbed into the solidity of her bed and not the make shift world of the wiz that was. The chenile spread given to her by her aunt was pulled off and onto the floor in the spot where she had just scrambled to escape. She pulled herself up and onto the familiar spaces of her bed in the security of her own familiar bedroom. Pictures of the every familiar face lined walls and sat in frames upon flat surfaced furniture to speak comfort missed during her bout with recovery; recovery from shock and uncertainty of future. She was glad to be home.

FINI