The Mouse and His Child

The Mouse Child:
Papa, I'm afraid! I wanna go home! What's gonna happen to us?

The Mouse:
Well, something good, son, as easily as something else. Why, anything can happen.

Manny the Rat:
But it won't! Not this evening, my lads!

Manny the Rat:
Two innocents abroad, eh? But for me, you'd be flattened to a fare-thee-well.

The Mouse Child:
I wanna go home.

Manny the Rat:
The very place I had in mind. Come on, now, my lovelies, I'm taking you home.

The Mouse Child:
We're going back to the toy shop?

The Mouse:
I don't think that's the home he's talking about.

The Mouse:
[after witnessing Ralphie dismantle the donkey] That was horrible!

The Mouse Child:
You're a bad rat!

Manny the Rat:
You noticed?

The Frog:
It's been very slow, boss. These are hard times for oracles.

Manny the Rat:
For incompetent ones.

The Frog:
Are you sayin' that my charms don't work? That my potions don't heal? That my fortunes are false?

Manny the Rat:
Of course. That's why I hired you.

Manny the Rat:
Frog, you're fired!

The Frog:
For bein' a fraud?

Manny the Rat:
For being a failure *as* a fraud!

Ralphie:
[talking to himself] Now, let's see, first thing, I go, uh, in the morning I go to the, um, uh, the guard!

The Mouse Child:
No, the manager.

The Mouse:
Son, don't help him. They'll make us thieves soon enough.

The Frog:
Tell you your fortune? Give me your palm.

The Mouse Child:
[indicating their permanently linked hands] We don't have one.

The Frog:
Can't read your hand. Well, no matter, I'll just read your feet.

Ralphie:
Their feet?

The Frog:
An ancient form of divination taught to me by the praying mantis of the Babylonian persuasion.

The Frog:
What would you have from the future? It could be anything you like.

The Mouse Child:
I want the Elephant to be my mama.

The Mouse:
You what - ?

The Mouse Child:
And the Seal to be my sister. And we'll all live together in the toy store.

The Frog:
An elephant? That's rather a large order. And you?

The Mouse:
I don't want anything given to me. I want something taken away.

The Frog:
What's that?

The Mouse:
Our key. The world being what it is, we'd be better off if we were free to wind ourselves.

Ralphie:
Aw, go ahead, I need a minute to think anyway.

The Frog:
At least.

Manny the Rat:
Those wind-ups will wind up scrap!

The Mouse:
[underwater] Please, take us to the surface

The Mouse Child:
...And wind us up

C. Serpentina:
Wind you up? Hm'... In what sense?