D: L&L - Part 22 | Scarecrow: Monkey See, Monkey Do

A couple of minutes into our flight, Turlo decided to show me some airborne acrobatic moves. He pirouetted and successfully attempted a number of 360 degree turns, while keeping hold of my shoulders. Which would have been very entertaining, if you were watching from below. You would have clapped and cheered, and thrown some money into his hat once he landed. You would have called “Encore!” but I wouldn’t have thanked you for it. If anything, I’d have nutted you with as much force as my straw head would have allowed. If Turlo thought he was cheering me up, dropping me from a height would have gone down better.

“Have you quite finished?” I croaked.

“I was kind of hoping you’d see my double-top, Boss,” he said, trying not to let his disappointment show. “I have medals for my prowess.”

“Whatever is left of my insides,” I replied, “I prefer to keep. And I still need that drink.”

“Snickety’s?” he asked.

“Good as any,” I said. “We’re not that far from Bright Lettins, are we?”

“Five miles, give or take. As the crow flies or the scenic root?”

I shuddered at his mention of crows. It would take me a while to get over the slaughter of the Munchkins, back at Three Dead Trees. To those who said I had no conscience when I was emperor of Oz, I wished they could see me now. I knew I had no choice. It was them or me. It didn’t make it any easier, though.

“Get me there as quick as you can, Turlo,” I said stiffly. “The sooner I imbibe, the better it will be for both of us.”

I had a thought. “Turlo,” I said, “if I needed help in getting Glinda off my throne, could I count on your people taking my side?”

To my surprise he answered straight away. “No.”

“Why not?”

“Did I say no? I meant to say yes.”

“Well which is it?”

“Both...I think.”

“You don’t know, do you?” I saw Bright Lettins on the horizon. We were travelling quicker than I thought. My next drink was looming closer every second. My lips smacked.

“No I don’t,” the monkey replied. “I’m sorry, Boss, I should have said that in the first place.”

I sighed. “It was the answer I was expecting. If push comes to shove, I’ll go talk to your leaders myself.”

Turlo sniggered. “Good luck with that. Hang on; we’re coming in to land.”

I caught my first sight of Bright Lettins in what seemed like decades. It looked like a coven of wicked witches had laid it to waste. I could smell death and destruction. Very few buildings were untouched by what I knew from recent experience were rioting Munchkins; a people contaminated by whatever madness came from that fog. I also saw the bar and with that, all thought of suffering vacated my brain.

“Hold on, Boss,” Turlo whispered. He jumped up on my shoulders again and I was suddenly afraid we might take off. “I think we need to scout around first, just in case there are more of them around.”

“More not-quite-dead things?” I said, hoping that my confident tone would go some way to assuage his worries. “You didn’t see me doing my crow stuff, did you?” I shrugged – not an easy movement to make when there’s a monkey on your back (see what I did there?). “Anything comes near us and I’ll poke them to death.”

“I’m safe enough,” Turlo replied. “I can just fly my ass out of here. But I seriously suggest we keep our eyes and ears open.”

“There’s no one around,” I said. “Look!” I pointed up the street. “Deserted.” I pointed down the street. “Likewise. They’re either all dead beyond resurrection, or else asleep.”

I pointed to Snickety’s. “Drink,” I said with increased confidence. “I’ll be fine once I’ve had a drink. We’ll be okay once we’ve rested.” I looked up at the monkey. “Trust me – I’m the Scarecrow.”

Turlo lowered his head. “Don’t get yourself killed, Boss,” he said. “Not on my watch.” Turlo looked up, down, left and right as we made our way over to the bar. We stopped at the main entrance. There was a door, but it was hanging on to its hinges for dear life. One good kick would see it meet its maker, but I knew there was plenty of room for us to just go by it. I felt Turlo shuffle uncomfortably on my shoulders. “What’s up now?” I said.

“I thought I saw someone scurry in this direction while we were landing. But I couldn’t make out whether it was man or animal or Munchkin.”

“It was probably a rat.”

“If so, it was a big rat.”

There was only one way to find out, I thought. I took a deep breath, pictured a few crows in my head (just in case of trouble), and then walked into the bar.

Turlo was right behind me, so what could go wrong? This was Snickety’s, after all, and no one ever got to old Snickety. Or so I thought.

The door hung off its hinges, leaning against the frame as if it was hanging on for dear life. I stepped into Snickety’s, ready to drown my troubles in something stiff and pungent. My first sight was a scene straight out of a nightmare: tables overturned, chairs broken, bodies scattered across the filthy floor. The stench of old beer and fresh gore mingled in a foul, purplish haze that hugged the floor like an old carpet.

The bar was a mishmash of shattered glass and splinters of broken chair legs, beyond wrecked—tables shoved aside, stools toppled, bits of tattered cloth strewn among what looked suspiciously like…well, let’s just call them bodily leftovers. I shoved a straw hand over my face when the smell hit me: stale beer, sweat, and something coppery. Something wrong.

I’d inhaled death before, seen the dead in numbers unimaginable—countable with my brains, and yet I’d been unable to count them. The TikTok Army had swept into the Emerald City on a cold winter morning, what once was a gleaming light leading the way from above, hovering there in her protective travel bubble, eyes bright with madness. The “bleeders,” they called them. That was the term the tiktoks had used as they slashed and hacked their way through my own forces, overwhelming the main guard force with ease. As each little tinny soldier fell, another stepped into his place while a host of tiktok medics conducted rapid repairs and put the little fuckers back into play.

I’d seen death before, knew what it smelled like. And all too often, I’d wished to feel it, too. A drink. I just needed a drink.

I scanned the room, searching for a living soul or at least someone in decent enough shape to confirm they were breathing. The corpses were scattered like puppets with their strings cut. An old man in a once-white apron lay behind the bar, his face twisted in silent horror, his fist wrapped around a heavy oak stick still dripping with blood. My straw bristles itched with nervous energy, but I forced myself closer. Two stiff fingers to his throat—pointless, maybe, but I had to try. He was colder than the porcelain mugs stacked beside him.

“Hello?” I croaked, my voice echoing in the gloom. Nothing but the drip-drip of some spilled liquid behind me. I prayed it was ale.

A soft rasp broke the silence. I whirled around to see a figure near the far wall. He wore tatters of the familiar—a Munchkin uniform, the color of it lost to dried blood. Very slowly, he rose to unsteady legs, and I felt a moment of hope. All was not lost. The guard here had won the day, which meant a celebration. A festival festooned with balloons and little Munchkinlanders on stilts and a parade and wine. Wine for fucking days. Your emperor has returned! Bring the vats!

Then, another shape rose behind him. And another. My stitched mouth parted in a gasp as I realized their eyes were clouded over, unfocused, yet locked on me. Not the victory I’d envisioned. Not the welcome I’d hoped for. But the thing I’d most feared.

Suddenly, the bar came to life with half-devoured men and women, shambling from shadowy corners like insects disturbed from a nest. A woman, or what had been one, dragged a busted ankle behind her. Her lips—torn and ragged—peeled back in a silent snarl. A little Munchkinlander man, his head lolling to the side on a twisted neck, purple like a horrific bruise. My panic soared. My mind flickered with crow-thoughts, but I couldn't form them fast enough. I was pinned by the weight of so many milky eyes. And then the body behind me shifted. A groan. A great sickening belch of fluid, and a raspy exhalation of filth. Snickety, his cudgel still in his grasp, climbed to his feet, and moaned, half his face and shoulder gone to bite marks.

I stumbled backward over an overturned table, straw poking out from a tear in my left arm. The largest of the walking dead lumping toward me. He was missing his jaw, but he still tried to moan through the mess of shredded flesh. With a hideous lunge, he dove at me. I dropped to my knees, straw bits scattering as I rolled away. My heart—if I’d had one—would’ve been pounding. My head—the one thing I’d wished to lose in a victorious vat of wine—suddenly precious again.

I pulled myself upright, scanning frantically for a way out. The door was barricaded with more writhing bodies, blocking my path, bony arms stretching out to grab hold of my burlap. Then I saw it: a wide, dusty window near the back. It was cracked but unbroken. My only chance.

I dashed for it. The undead closed in, hissing and clacking like broken marionettes. A rotted hand snatched at my sleeve, nails catching in the loose stitching. I jerked free, leaving half a handful of straw behind. Another figure slithered across the bar top, teeth gnashing. I felt a burning in my straw guts that had nothing to do with actual pain and everything to do with primal terror.

“Sorry, folks, but I’ve had my fill of carnage for tonight,” I muttered, mustering whatever dry humor I could.

Then I hurled myself bodily at the window, bracing for the crash. My shoulder met the glass with a sharp, splintering impact, and shards exploded outward in a glittering rain. Air rushed around me, a merciful shock after the suffocating stench inside. I flew through the opening and landed hard on the street, scraping my burlap arms on the rough cobblestones. Splinters of glass clung to my stuffing, but I was still in one piece—miraculously.

For a breathless moment, I lay there, too stunned to move. Behind me, I heard the dead pressing closer, shuffling and rasping, hungry for another taste of life. I staggered to my feet, bits of glass tinkling to the ground and looked up and down the alley, finding more bodies jerking on the ground, coming to life.

I glanced back at the broken window—saw pale, grasping hands—and knew it was time to run. The night was full of new horrors, but at least out here, I had a fighting chance. Clutching my torn arm, I bolted into the ruined streets of Bright Lettins, praying I could outrun the nightmares crawling from that bar.