We rang the bell at the front gate, and were greeted by the same Guardian Dude from—what was it, a week ago? Two weeks? I couldn’t even keep track.

“What! Are you back again?” he asked.

“Don’t act so surprised.”

“But I thought you had gone to visit the Wicked Witch of the West.”

“We did visit her,” the Scarecrow said.

“And she let you go again?”

“She could not help it, for she is melted,” the Scarecrow explained.

“From a bucket of water,” I added. “It was not that hard.”

“Good gracious!” He bowed very low, then brought us into the room with the box full of gross, sweaty sunglasses to affix to our faces. I was pretty much done with that part, though.

“I am Dorothy the Witchkiller,” I said. “I melted one, and crushed the other beneath a house. My eyes cannot be blinded by even the gaudiest interior design, so I’m all set, thanks.”

I never did manage to convince the others that the whole thing was just a hoax, so they all took the green shades, and I let them put a pair on Toto, too, so they wouldn’t sic Munchkin PETA on my ass or whatever.

Once we entered the city proper and were on our way to the Wizard’s palace, I almost regretted my decision. Without the glasses, the place didn’t look any greener than your average fairy tale metropolis, but all those glittering gems made it bright as balls.

News spread quickly of the witch melting, and by the time we reached the palace we were surrounded by a cheering crowd. So that was kind of rad. The soldier—whose beard was actually brown with flecks of gray, incidentally—went straight to alert the Wizard to our presence, while Concierge Girl brought us to our usual parlor to wait for him.

And wait we did. Two hours later, I was about ready to sneak out and find a bath somewhere to wash the Flying Monkey off me. Finally, the soldier popped his head into the room and whispered something into Concierge Girl’s ear.

“Oz the Great and Terrible needs time to prepare for you,” she said. “I will show you to your rooms, and he’ll be ready to receive you in the morning.” She winced. “Or perhaps the next day, or the day after that.”

Like hell. If I’d wanted any more days of lounging around doing nothing, I would have done it back at Winkie Castle. And as eager as I was to bathe—

Actually, the faint whiff of monkey reminded me of something. Didn’t the Monkey King say one of his jobs for the Wicked Witch was to shoo Oz off her land?

“You tell that Wizard that I command the Flying Monkeys,” I said, “and if there’s some reason he can’t see us today, he can explain it to them.”

That seemed to do the trick, because she disappeared, and moments later we were hurried into Oz’s throne room. Inside, we didn’t find a big floating head, a hot girl, a giant monster or a ball of fire. In fact, the place was empty.

Had the Wizard just taken off? After a minute, a voice came from a hidden speaker somewhere near the top of the domed room.

“I am Oz, the Great and Terrible! Why do you seek me?”

I looked around and didn’t see a curtain anywhere. There was, however, a little screen set up in one corner. “You know why we seek you,” I said. “Why don’t you come out from your hiding place so we can get this over with?”

“I am not hiding!” he said. “I am everywhere! But to the eyes of common mortals I am invisible. I will now seat myself upon my throne, that you may converse with me.” Sure enough, the last line sounded like it came from the throne. The Wizard was leaning on his hidden speaker trick hard.

Whatever. “We killed your witch, and we’re back for our rewards.”

“What rewards?” he demanded.

The Scarecrow seemed almost as tired of getting dicked around as I was. “You promised to give me brains!”

“And you promised to give me a heart!” the Woodsman said.

“And you promised to give me courage!” added the Lion.

“And you promised to send me home,” I said. “We will also accept hollow platitudes and incompetent balloon piloting if it finally gets this fucking plot moving.”

There was a pause. “Is the Wicked Witch really destroyed?” Now there was definitely a tremble in the voice.

“Yup,” I said. “Melted with a bucket of water.”

“Oh, man,” said the Voice. “Man! Well, come to me tomorrow, for I must have time to think it over.”

“You’ve had plenty of time already,” the Tin Woodsman said angrily.

“We shan’t wait a day longer!” the Scarecrow agreed.

The Lion chimed in with a fierce roar, which was so loud that Toto jumped away from him in alarm and tipped over the screen in the corner. Sure enough, behind it was a frumpy little man. He wasn’t, like, Wizard of Oz old, but maybe thirty-five or forty, with a scruffy red beard all over his face and neck, like no one had ever taught him how to shave.

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“I am Oz, the Great and Terrible,” he said, his voice trembling even more now. “Please don’t hit me.”

“Okay,” I said. “What the hell?”

“Hush, my dear,” he said. I decided right then and there that if he called me “my dear” one more time, I would punch him. “Don’t speak so loud,” he continued, “or you will be overheard, and I should be ruined. I’m supposed to be a Great Wizard!”

“And aren’t you?” the Scarecrow asked.

“Not a bit. I’m just a common man.”

“You’re more than that,” I said. “You’re a fucking douchebag.”

“Yeah, I guess I am,” he said.

“But this is terrible!” said the Woodsman. “How shall I ever get my heart?”

“Or I my courage?” asked the Lion.

“Or I my brains?” wailed the Scarecrow, wiping the tears from his eyes with his coat sleeve.

“You think you have problems?” said Oz, “What about me? What about the terrible trouble I’m going to be in now that I’ve been found out?”

“You mean nobody else has figured out that you’re a douchebag?” I asked.

“No one knows it but you four—and myself,” he said. “I have fooled everyone so long that I thought I’d never be found out. I guess it was a mistake my ever letting you into the throne room. Usually I won’t even see my subjects, and so they believe I’m something terrible.”

He showed us a small chamber in the back of the throne room where he hid all of his tricks—the giant head was just paper mache, with obvious wires that worked the eyes and mouth. The one I saw back when we first arrived definitely had better special effects than this one did, but it’s not like I was fooled anyway, so I didn’t make a stink. He also showed us the mask and dress he had worn to appear as a beautiful woman to the Scarecrow, and when the Woodsman saw it, he actually shuddered. He clearly had a fair amount of fantasy time invested in the mysterious Lady, based solely on the Scarecrow’s description.

“And the Beast was a statue, and the fireball was a bag of flaming trash, we get it,” I said. “And you have speakers in the walls and chair to make your voice come from wherever.”

“Oh, there are no speakers in Oz,” he said. “I am a trained ventriloquist! I can throw the sound of my voice wherever I wish! Sit down, please, there are plenty of chairs. I will tell you my story.”

“Ugh. Fine, but make it quick.”

“I was born in the faraway land of Van Nuys, California—”

Van Nuys? “That’s right by Studio City, where my Dad lives!”

“Wait. You’re from the real world?” His face went white. “Oh my god. It’s been so long.”

He grabbed me by my hoodie. “Tell me the news! Did the Super Nintendo ever come out? Was Mode 7 as revolutionary as they said? And what of Final Fantasy II?”

He was shaking now. “Tell me, what of Final Fantasy II?”

If Final Fantasy was the video game I was thinking of, I was pretty sure they were up to like fifteen or twenty by now. This guy had been in Oz a long time. “It’s so good,” I said. “You should come back and play it with me. You’ll love it.”

He shook his head gravely. “I was just a kid,” he said. “I went into a new shop in the Galleria, and they said they had the latest virtual reality technology, but when I went into the booth I blacked out, and woke up on a hot air balloon, floating over a strange and beautiful country.”

His story sounded awfully familiar. “It came down gradually,” he continued, “and I was not hurt a bit. But I found myself in the midst of a strange people, who, seeing me come from the clouds, thought I was a great Wizard. Of course I let them think I was, because they were afraid of me, and promised to do anything I wished. I ordered them to build this city, and my palace, and they did it all happily.”

“And when we finally showed up, you didn’t figure out that you were inside the plot of The Wizard of Oz?”

“I never watched The Wizard of Oz! My sister watched it a lot, so I knew a little something about it, but it always seemed like kind of a girl thing.”

He explained that he had spent decades afraid of the evil Witches from the east and west, so when I came and killed one of them, he was willing to offer me whatever I wanted to take care of the other. “But, now that you have melted her,” he said, “I’m ashamed to say that I can’t keep my promises.”

“Because you’re a douchebag,” I said.

“No!” he insisted. “I’m a really nice guy! But I’m a very bad Wizard, I must admit.”

The Scarecrow was forlorn. “Can’t you give me brains?”

“You don’t need them! You’re learning something every day. A baby has brains, but it doesn’t know much. Experience is the only thing that brings knowledge, and the longer you are on earth the more experience you get.”

“That may all be true,” said the Scarecrow, “but I shall be very unhappy unless you give me brains.”

The Wizard looked at him carefully and scratched his beard.

“Well,” he said with a sigh, “I’m not much of a magician, but if you come to me tomorrow morning, I will stuff your head with brains. I cannot tell you how to use them, however. You must find that out for yourself.”

The Scarecrow was over the moon. “Oh, thank you—thank you! I’ll find a way to use them, never fear!”

“But how about my courage?” the Lion asked.

“You have plenty of courage, man,” answered Oz. “All you need is confidence in yourself. There is no living thing that is not afraid when it faces danger. True courage is in facing danger when you are afraid, and that kind of courage you have in plenty.”

“Perhaps. But can you give some of the other kind?”

“Very well, I will give you that sort of courage tomorrow,” he said.

I was about ninety percent sure that by tomorrow we’d discover that the Wizard had skipped town.

“How about my heart?” the Tin Woodsman asked.

“Why, as for that,” Oz said, “I think you are wrong to want a heart. It makes most people unhappy.”

“That must be a matter of opinion,” said the Woodsman. “For my part, I will bear all the unhappiness without a murmur, if you will give me the heart.”

“Very well. Come to me tomorrow and you shall have a heart. I have played Wizard for so many years that I may as well continue the part a bit longer.”

“Okay,” I said. “So how are you going to get me home?”

“We shall have to think about that,” he said. “Give me two or three days to consider the matter and I’ll try to find a way to carry you over the desert.”

“What about the balloon? Do you still have the balloon?”

“I said I need time to think! In the meantime you shall all be treated as my guests. There is only one thing I ask in return for my help, such as it is. You must keep my secret and tell no one I am a fake.”

We agreed. I was fairly confident that the next part would follow the book, and he’d balloon off by himself and I’d have to somehow figure out how to use the shoes to get home. But I looked at my friends, whose faces were all filled with hope.

If he tried to ditch us without giving them each their magic feather or whatever, I was going to kick that little gremlin’s ass.