Kate Austen and
Willy Wonka Enter…The CAGE
On the morning of the second day of the Games, Willy Wonka
wakes from a night of uneasy slumber. The
sun has just risen and Wonka raises himself to a sitting position, looking
around for the impromptu alliance he had joined yesterday at the
Cornucopia.
After bolting from his pedestal for a backpack filled with
cash and candy near the Cornucopia yesterday morning, Wonka had found himself
in a fight with Nic Cage. As they were
wrestling for the mutually desired backpack, however, Nic suddenly eased his
grip, looked Wonka directly in the eye and said in a hauntingly calm voice,
“only a fool chases a dream, but a dream never chases a fool.” He then released the backpack and walked away
unexplainedly. Before he could process
these odd actions, Wonka was cut on the arm by a Dwight Schrute-tossed ninja
star. Falling to a knee and grimacing in
pain, Wonka quickly felt someone pulling him up by his uninjured arm. He was on his feet again before he noticed it
was Kate Austen, the attractive brunette he’d befriended before the Games
began. “Come on, I can clean that wound
for you, and you can help me find and cook food, let’s team up,” Kate
said. He agreed, thinking to himself
that a partner wouldn’t be a bad thing to have.
She may not be as helpful as a team of Ooompa Loompas, fair enough, but
she could keep watch while his creative genius manifested itself in the
woods. Yes, he thought, there he would
create a world of his own pure imagination, a world of booby traps and sadistic
whimsy that would lure in the greedy and selfish of the tributes. There was one child in particular he’d like
to teach a lesson, a foul-mouthed little blonde boy who kept demanding cheese
pizza at all the Tribute’s events before the start of the Games. Besides, it got lonely living in a large chocolate factory, and Wonka couldn't pretend that Kate's flowing, dark brown
hair and bright smile
weren't a pleasant change of scenery from the orange skin and green hair he’d become
accustomed to. Wonka and Kate
began to move away from the circle of pedestals and chaos when Nic Cage
appeared suddenly in front of them, saying in a solemn voice, “I’d like to join you’re alliance, you both
have noble hearts. It would be an honor
to battle along side you.” “Did you
change clothes!?” Wonka couldn’t help but spit out, flabbergasted by the
mysterious man, “and how did your hair change, it was short earlier?” But Nic Cage simply responded slowly, peering
knowingly into Wonka’s very soul, “a tiger may change his stripes, but the
wolf…the wolf howls at the moon.” Neither Wonka nor Kate managed a response and
before they could even look at each other Cage turned on his heal, “follow me. We’ll head to the woods.” And they followed.
Now, in the sunlight of the early morning, Wonka rubs his
eyes. He sees Kate Austen sleeping soundly
a few feet from him. Gently, he shakes
her shoulder until her eyes open. “Good
morning. Where’s Nic?” Kate asks
groggily. “How should I know?” Wonka says, a bit more aggressively than he
means to, he can’t quite explain the twinge of irritation he feels at Kate’s
question. “C’mon, let’s find some breakfast,”
he suggests, careful to carry a softer tone.
They walk a short circle around their campsite, collecting plants, bugs
and berries. Kate’s island experience
has made her very efficient at gathering food from the wild. When they return to the campsite, she makes a
fire and Wonka begins to employ his considerable culinary gifts. Soon they have a delicious feast of exotic
treats. Wonka feels a warmth spread out
from his chest when Kate, trying one of his snozzberry-flavored concoctions, closes her eyes and lets a soft, “mmmm” escape. While eating they begin to discuss the
previous day. Once in the woods
yesterday, their time had mostly been spent putting space between themselves
and the Cornucopia (particularly Achilles…) and looking for a place to sleep.
When night had fallen they were all shocked to see Achilles’ face appear in the
sky (the Gamemakers project in the sky the faces of the fallen that day), all
except Cage. He was, quite simply,
inexplicable; they both agreed. For the
most part he spoke only in parables and enigmatic axioms, save for the full,
two-and-a half hour biography of John Quincy Adams that he regaled them with
later in the night. Wonka wasn’t sure
what to make of the man. He both
resented him for out eccentric-ing Willy Wonka himself and feared the man for
his unnerving calm and encyclopedic knowledge of American history.
“When Nic looks at you,” Kate says between bites of her
breakfast, “do you feel like he’s…like he’s…I don’t know, peering into your
soul. Like he sees everything there is
inside you, deep down…even things you might not know yet?” She finishes, gazing
out into the woods. “He certainly has an
intense gaze,” Wonka replies carefully, looking at Kate out of the corner of
his eye and secretly thinking to himself that that was exactly how he felt. It
bothers him, he realizes after a brief moment of reflection, that Nic has this
effect. He, Willy Wonka, was supposed to
be the enigmatic figure who knows what everyone’s thinking, he’s the brilliant genius who always
knows the cards in everyone’s hands.
Also, he has to admit, it gnaws at him a bit that there was a hint of
excitement in Kate’s voice when she asked him the question.
“In my travels,” comes a voice from behind them, startling
both Kate and Wonka, “I have countless times feasted upon the fruits of the
field and the nectars of the flower. The
meal you’ve prepared here is a meal of honor, prepared with courage. I commend you for that.” Seemingly out of nowhere, Nic Cage now stands
behind Wonka and Kate, not looking at either of them but staring up at the sky,
searchingly. “Thanks,” Wonka finally
gets out, “hey, did you find a stockpile of clothes or something, you’ve
changed outfits again…and I swear your hair is different.” Cage lowers his gaze from the sky and walks
over to the dwindling fire. He picks out
a charred stick and begins to rub ash on his fingers. “In the land of the naked, William” he speaks
slowly, each word heavy with gravitas, “it is the clothed…” as he speaks he
walks over to Kate and draws a strange hieroglyphic-looking symbol on her cheek
with the ash, “who are firemakers…” He
finishes and walks over to Wonka, drawing another symbol on his cheek as well,
“but the fire…it comes from within.” He
finishes drawing and stands up. “We
should move from here.”
Wonka is simply dumbfounded, he is the riddle-maker; what is Cage doing? Besides,
Cage has taken things to a new level of inscrutability, Wonka thinks to
himself, this is ridiculous! His consternation with Cage begins to mingle
explosively with his frustration with Kate, as she looks utterly spell-bound. She and he had gotten along so well, Wonka
thought. They had a history from before
the Games began! They had been friends
during the training, chatted often during the Tributes’ dinners. If only he could show her that he, too, was
mysterious and riddlingly prophetic. These
thoughts race through Wonka’s mind as the trio begins to move through the woods. Suddenly, a voice comes calling through the
woods, a high-pitched voice, a child’s voice…a voice Wonka immediately
recognizes. “Hey you guys! I’m over
here! I’m really scared and I’m
aaaallllll alone.”
“No, Willy! Don’t
chase him!!” But Wonka’s adrenaline has taken over and his blood is pumping too
fast in his ears to hear Kate’s shout.
He’s already darted deep into the woods after the little
troublemaker. The combination of Cage-related
befuddlement and desire to shift the tides of Kate’s affection finally manifest
themselves as Wonka tears through the forest after the toe-headed fiend. Just
like that spoiled rich girl and that fat German, I’ll teach this little monster
a lesson, once I find…But he has no time to finish his thought. There he is, the boy, up in a thin but tall
tree ahead of him. Wonka runs up and
begins to climb the tree, huffing and puffing a sing-song as he slowly climbs,
eyes focused intently on the tree he clings to and his careful hand-placement,
“oompa…loompa” he pants heavily between each word, “loompa dee doo…” His
top-hat has fallen off and a vain is throbbing ferociously on Wonka’s forehead
as he struggles to clamber up the tall tree; he’s lost now in his “JackTorrance-ian” lunacy. “Willy…Wonka…is…coming….for…you,”
he grunts out the last word with a maniacal grin. Wonka looks down, he’s fifty feet up. He looks up the tree for the boy, who should
be a mere ten feet or so from him but he doesn’t see the child. “Hey! I’m
over here,” the boy says playfully with a friendly wave. He’s eye-level with Wonka, on the nearest
tree. “What?! How did you…?!” just then Wonka notices a very
thin rope has been tied to the tree he’s holding on to, secured about twenty
feet above him, the other end held by the boy in the next tree over. With a panic Wonka realizes how thin the
trunk has become as he’s climbed higher and higher. He notices now how unstable the tree is,
swaying with his weight. “See ya!” says
the boy as he gives the rope a mighty pull.
A loud crack near the base of the tree sends birds nearby scattering as
Willy’s weight and the boy’s tug of the rope become too much for the thin
tree.
Finally on the ground, a young Kevin McCallister goes to one
knee and gives several Tiger Woods fist pumps with a victorious but quiet,
“Yessssssss!”before scurrying off.
ELIMINATED FROM THE COMPETITION: WILLY WONKA
2) Dalton - 10/1
3) Katniss
- 20/1
4) Super
Mario - 30/
5) Dwight
Schrute - 35/1
6) Nic
Cage - 40/1
8) Kate
– 60/1
9) Kevin
McCallister – 75/1
12) Helen of Troy - 90/1
16) Lenny –
120/1
17) Steve Urkel
– 200/1
18) Charlie
Kelly – 250/1
19) Marcia
Brady – 300/1
22) Miss Piggy
– 800/1
24) Boo Radley
- ?
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