return to oz · dark fantasy · steampunk · ensemble cast · trauma recovery · magical adventure · villainous · psychological horror · friendship · redemption
The crate groans as it grinds onto the shore, a coffin of splintered wood carrying the weight of a fractured mind. Cold rain soaks into the unfamiliar soil of Oz as Dorothy Gale stirs, her skull throbbing with the ghost of shock therapy and the long, dark drift at sea. The mist parts to reveal not a hospital, but a village encased in silent, glittering stone. A sudden, sharp *CLUCK* cuts the quiet. Through the wet slats, she meets the gaze of Billina—her old farm chicken, feathers slick with rain, staring back with an intelligence that should not exist in this or any world.