How It All Goes Down
- We jump forward in time, to three years after Fiyero's graduation from Shiz.
- Fiyero is visiting an old chapel in the Emerald City, hoping to find a picture of Saint Glinda. Apparently he is rocking the nostalgia.
- But religious icons are hard to come by in the Emerald City:
You'll be lucky if [Saint Glinda's portrait] hasn't been papered over with a poster of Our Glorious Wizard. (3.1.4) - But Fiyero sees something way more exciting than an old painting lurking in the church: it's Elphaba!
- Elphaba pretends she doesn't know him. Ooh, burn.
- She finally concedes that she might know him and agrees to meet him outside the chapel. But she's lying and sneaks off instead.
- Fiyero won't be deterred, though, and he tries to follow her.
- No one has seen or heard from Elphaba since she disappeared from Shiz five years ago.
- Fiyero finally catches up with her and corners her. She refuses to speak to him at first but finally invites him up to her little apartment.
- Elphaba lives alone in a tiny garret (attic room) with her cat Malky.
- Fiyero tells Elphaba what he's been up to for the past five years: he's married to a woman named Sarima and has three children. He's the prince of his native tribe and is in the Emerald City on business.
- Elphaba refuses to answer questions about herself.
- She is upset when Fiyero informs her that Glinda married a baronet and is very high society now.
- Fiyero asks her point blank:
"Why did you cut us all off?"
"I loved you too much to keep in touch."
"What does that mean?"- "Don't ask me," she said, thrashing a bit.
(3.1.66-69) - Finally, after Fiyero's hard-hitting questioning (he must watch Law and Order) Elphaba cracks and admits that she works for an underground resistance movement.
- Elphaba is worried that Fiyero secretly works for the Gale Force, the Wizard's secret police. (Fun fact: Dorothy's last name in The Wizard of Oz is Gale. Coincidence?)
- The Gale Force seem to have a lot in common with other secret police forces in history, like the Nazi Gestapo, the Stasi in Communist East Germany, and the KGB in Soviet Russia. Want to read more about secret police forces in history? Go here.
- She then throws Fiyero out. He protests and finally leaves, promising that he'll be back and won't give up.