Alice in Wonderland IC [Irell Starling and Zitacamron95]

[Irell Starling]

Alice’s face lit up as she ate a piece of cake. ”This is really good,” she said before take another bite, practically purring. The cake was moist and had a rich texture. ”Really, really good. Where did you two learn to cook? At The Golden Afternoon?” She greedily continued to enjoy her piece of peanut butter-chocolaty-goodness, glad that she was finally eating something ‘normal’. That’s when she realized the twins seemed to be waiting for something. Putting down her fork, Alice looked at the two of them.

”Oh! Yes, I agree. I’ll help you try to get the two of them together but I have to warn you I’m not particularly good at this.” For one, she wasn’t o the best terms with the Hare and even the Hatter seemed annoyed by her every now and then. For another, Alice didn’t have a lot of experience with match making, on the contrary, she was often on the receiving end as her friends, most of whom where in long term relationships themselves. If she didn’t get back in a timely manner Alice would be could be accidentally standing up her twenty-first blind date. Then again, once everyone realized she was missing, that blind date would be the least of her problems.

Alice looked over at the Hatter’s chair sitting against the wall. ”Do you want to take a peek on how it’s going?” she asked them conspiratorially, ”We’ll have to be quite though or they might hear us.” she said indicating the ‘spy hole’.

-----

”Why do you think I always follow after you, Ethan? Why do I always go along with your crazy plans even after I try to talk you out of them?” Martius snapped. Even when it caused finally trouble for me when the Queen decided to double the taxes on my restaurant when she couldn’t get to you? ”And it’s not her name and you know it.” Martius replied backing away, ”I’ve always felt guilty about it and saying Emily’s name or not doesn’t change that fact. You and her were supposed to end up happy. It could have been perfect. But now she’s dead and you’re…you’re…” The Hare began to fidget, irritation showing in his movements. A silence hung in the air as a light breeze brushed over the rooftops of abandoned buildings.

[Zitacamron95]

"Actually, we're just waiters at The Golden Afternoon, we were taught how to cook by our father, who used to be a cook," William shrugged, "When he came home, we would make dinner as a family, and sometimes we would just take a bunch of things we like put it together in some sort of meal and make something new." Those were the days of their childhood though, they didn't get to enjoy those times anymore. They would have given everything up for just one of those afternoons again, it wasn't like they hated their lives or wanted to be dead, they just wanted their dad back again. They only could remember those days they got to be with each other, though they only slipped by and the two had to learn everything they could from their father instead of going to school. They would never complain that their lives were bad now though, they enjoyed having their fun with the queen and getting their justice and they loved having friends like Hatter and Hare, it just made things a lot more interesting for them.

When Alice mentioned spying on the two outside, they couldn't resist the offer, the two pushed the chair out of the way and peeked out the window to see what was going on. They figured that they should see what they would be expecting when the two came back inside anyways, it's not like everything was going to happen at once but it was good to figure out how things were going. When they saw what was going on though, they didn't seem too pleased anymore, not after seeing how things were already going with only a moment of being alone. Maybe, it would have been better for the two to not talk about everything that had happened after all, they probably should have just let things go on and ignored all of this. All they wanted was to see the two finally happy, but those weren't smiles and that didn't please William or Leon at all, and this could get greatly in the way for what was to come.

------

Ethan started to feel like an arrow had been shot into his chest. He wasn't sure how to respond to Martius talking about all those times they had gone out on one of his adventures. Then when Martius couldn't finish his sentence, Ethan glared at The March Hare, "Insane, I'm insane! I know what I am, Martius, you don't have to point it out to me, just like you don't need me pointing out the fact that you're a drug addict! And I am just as happy with you as I would have been with her! Wait..." Ethan paused as he thought about The Hare's words, suddenly his face grew pale, "You and her were supposed to end up happy. It could have been perfect..." Ethan repeated Martius' words exactly, his eyes looked at Martius as tears started to fill them. "Sh-She was in love with me?" He felt as if he was just about to fall over, it couldn't have been possible, was that why all this time he had always felt so responsible for her death?

Before the tears could fall though, he shook his head and wiped away the ones that were trying to form. "Nothing would have changed, Martius, it would have been dreadful for all of us. I would have had to break her heart...I thought of her like...a sister. You should stop blaming yourself...it wasn't your fault at all that I've gone crazy, or Emily's death. Just like my mental illness came long before I even met you, Emily would have died whether she loved you, me, or neither of us. You know Jack is easily tempered and would have killed her either way after she refused his proposal."

[Irell Starling]

Alice pressed her face against the hole, taking turns with the twins. She too could see that things outside had gone from bad to much, much worse. Martius looked irritated, his mouth set in a grim line. And while she couldn’t see the Hatter’s face from this angle, from his body language he didn’t appear to be happy either. ”Well this isn’t going well,” Alice mouthed. Suddenly raised voices caused her to duck as she backed away from the hole. ”What should we do?” she whispered to them but Martius’s angry voice floated through the wall, silencing her. The last thing wanted was the Hatter and Hare to realize they had ben spying on them.

-----

”Yes well at least I’m happy being a drug addict!” Martius snapped at the Hatter comment about his life choice. And truly he didn’t mind. Sure it wasn’t the healthiest of habits but it was legal, didn’t endanger the lives of others, and helped ease the mental chaos of his over active mind. What he had really meant to say was that the Hatter was so unhappy now and alone but he couldn’t put that thought into words and now it was gone, over thrown by anger.

”Yes of course she loved you,” the Hare said, his voice taking on a bitter note. ”We all love you. The twins love you,” he said pointing at the tavern’s door, ”I’m sure even the girl loves you in her own past-prodding way.”” I love you.” but Martius, so afraid of ruining their friendship and so guilt ridden with past sins, couldn’t make those words form in his mouth.

That’s when Ethan explained his feelings towards Emily. Martius shook his head as if trying to rid himself of confusion. ”But… I don’t understand…” No. It didn’t make any sense at all. For years he had been under the assumption that the Hatter had loved Emily back only he had never admitted it to her for some reason. ”But I was certain you… like a sister?... Yes I guess she would have died either way… poor Emily. I’m glad she never had to know. She would have been crushed. She loved you so much that she couldn’t bear to be with anyone else including Jack.”

And suddenly all the guilt was gone.

----

Alice began to tug on Leon’s (or was it William’s) shirt. Between this conversation and the one in Dr. Beddo’s office, she was finally beginning to understand. A revolution was going on in her mind as all the puzzle pieces began to snap together. ”Like a sister!” she almost squeal and then began to whisper hurriedly, ”That’s probably why Mr. Hatter sees Emily! She probably reminded him of Annabelle, his older sister! When Emily died maybe it was like Annabelle dying all over again. That would explain why he sees both of them. I bet he feels guilty about Emily’s death too. And poor Mr. Leveret probably felt so guilty because he thought his friend was in love and her death not only made Mr. Hatter go insane again but also took away the person he loved. Only he really didn’t love Emily. Do you think, do you think Mr. Hatter loves the Hare?”

[Zitacamron95]

"Martius, if I had loved Emily, don't you think I would have done a lot more about her death? I mean I tried all I could, but I probably would have either gone more insane or tried to kill Jack at the very least," Hatter sighed, he was trying so hard not to put the guilt on him, now feeling like he had been leading Emily on all those years. He didn't understand how The March Hare could confuse it for love or even how Emily could have loved someone like him, even when they first met he wasn't right in the head. He stole for a living -and still does- he saw his dead sister walking around, and well, Hatter had plenty of problems wrong with him. His head was filled with insanity, like it was just the way he was meant to live, and continue his life with a mind filled to the brim with nothing more than madness. He never really saw Emily as anything more than a sister that he enjoyed being around and having fun with.

"Was that really why you felt so guilty about Emily's death?" Hatter asked, "I still don't understand it at all. If you had just asked me, I would have told you that a long time ago..." Ethan thought about this for a moment before a new thought came into his head, of a completely different topic, but still quite related to what they were talking about. He thought Martius had been taking that drug to get rid of all this guilt towards Emily's death, but was it really just Emily? "Oh, gods, please don't tell me you were using that drug because of me," Hatter looked at the ground, "I'm sorry."

------

William and Leon looked at Alice for a moment, wondering how she would even know all about this. They were sure the Hatter wouldn't have said anything about his dead older sister, unless she had listened into a conversation between Hare and Hatter. That really wasn't important anymore, though, it seemed that if Emily had been in the way of Hare trying to tell Hatter about loving him, that was gone now. It brought excitement and hope to their minds as they pushed each other out of the way to get a look on what was going on outside. It seemed things had calmed down, at least for now, who knew what could rise up the next moment if they weren't careful? They were just hoping that everything was solved with this whole Emily thing and whatever else needed to be said would come out when time was ready and things would be a lot smoother from here when it came to talking. It would be nice if the two didn't argue every time something big started to become part of the conversation.

When Alice asked about Ethan loving Martius they looked at her for a moment blinking. "It's kind of hard to tell," whispered Leon.

"If Hatter does love Martius, he probably doesn't know it himself, I don't think he's ever had any experience with love other than family," William explained, in a hushed tone, "He probably will never know it, if nothing ever happens between the two of them."

[Irell Starling]

Alice thought about what the twins had said, her heart falling a little. ”Is it better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all?” she said quoting famous words. She doubted it very much. Leon and William seemed so excited about the prospects but Alice was scared for Martius. What would happen to their relationship if Ethan didn’t have mutual feelings for the Hare? Alice backed away then, allowing the twins to fight over the peep hole alone. ”Have you ever been in love?” she asked them, certain of their answer.

-----

”I wasn’t using the drug because of you.” Martius said walking over and lifting Ethan’s chin up. It was only partially true, but the Hare didn’t want it to weight on the Hatter’s conscience. Martius had started using the drug shortly after Ethan had checked himself in the asylum. Those were dark days indeed. Left to his own devices and constantly wracked by guilt, Martius threw himself at whatever would keep his mind distracted. Gambling had only worked for so long, as did cold showers and long walks in the park. The only thing that worked permanently was the drug which kept his world blissfully numb. On the one month anniversary of her death, Martius ended up using too much and almost found himself following Emily into the other world. It took him a while but he began to try to get himself clean. Then Ethan came back and Martius found that his best friend was now emotionally scared and overly reckless. After that the drug became his crutch as he tried to navigate his guilt riddled world. ”We all have our ways of dealing with the pane. Some of us do drugs while others go insane.”

”And how was I supposed to know you didn’t love her?” Martius continued ” Of course I felt guilty. I felt like I tore away the person you were in love with because of pride, because I wanted Jack to suffer knowing Emily loved me instead. You went to the asylum after she died. What was I supposed to think?” Martius let go of the Hatter’s chin. It was his time to look at the floor now, ”I know how painful it is to loose someone you love.”

[Zitacamron95]

"Yes, actually, a few times," Leon answered, quite blatantly, as he watched outside, things seemed to have gotten better out there. His eyes widened as Martius had gotten close to Ethan, but the excitement was lost when nothing happened and they just started to speak again. Actually, the twins were starting to get quite bored of this whole event and were ready to just leave the two alone, they were sure nothing else was going to happen. So, they finally stepped away from the window and went back to clean up the dishes from dinner, and put the leftovers away. There wasn't going to be anything interesting going on for quite some time with those two anyways, everything had been so calm, and quite that it was hard to tell now after this fight what would happen to the two anyways. It might just make a friendship stronger, make love form, or even crumble horribly apart, which the two were hoping the last one would never come.

"My first crush happened to be on an girl in the orphanage, being really young it wasn't something I completely understood at that point, but it was still a crush," William smirked remembering those few moments, but there weren't that many after they were adopted, "Leon's first crush was at the orphanage too, but that girl was ill and died...We both fell in love with the same girl when we were living with our father and our lives had gotten quite normal, she was a store clerk or something...I don't know we hung out with her all the time, but she didn't like us in that way. Then, I did have a relationship for a while with a co-worker."

"If we hadn't had any experience we wouldn't be trying to set those two up," Leon shrugged, "It's just a little harder, when Ethan probably doesn't even know what love is...or maybe he does and he's just really good at hiding his feelings..."

------

"You should have asked," Hatter shrugged, "I would have told you straight out, I probably would have told Emily if she had asked too, I'm so clueless I wouldn't have even noticed that I had broken her heart." Ethan shook his head as he thought about all these things he had missed that caused Emily's death as well. It was almost hard to think about how he had missed so much. He thought of what would have happened if Emily hadn't died and what things would have been different, he probably wouldn't have been friends with Emily anymore. It was horrible to think of all these other problems would have come up and Ethan wasn't even sure if he could have ever avoided the asylum at all anymore. "You did nothing more than what I would have done if I were in your position. I wouldn't have been able to stop myself from saying something like that to someone like Jack. Every now and then it's nice to tell him he can't have everything he wants."

Ethan looked at Martius after he talked about knowing the feeling of losing a loved one. Ethan decided there was only one option in this whole thing, so he hugged Martius. "You know what I just realized?" Ethan asked as he paused for a moment even though he was still hugging The March Hare, and stayed like that for just a while longer. Was Martius always this warm? "There is cake in the tavern and we're out here talking about things we can't even change..."

[Irell Starling]

Alice’s eyes followed the twins as they began cleaning up from dinner. So they both had loved and one of them had loved someone who had died. ”Then maybe it wasn’t such a bad things after all,” Alice thought, ”It does seems like nonsense to me. Maybe it’s just one of those quirky things about Wonderland or life in general.” She continued to watch the twins, their movements seemed to reflect the synchrony of people who had either worked or spent a lot of time together. The Hatter and Hare had it too when they had squared off against the Queen’s soldiers back at Ethan’s house. Feeling a tad lonely but mostly sleepy Alice crawled onto the stuffed chair behind her and shut her eyes.

-----

Martius let out a breath he didn’t even know he was holding as his heat fell. ”Cake!?” he said out loud, looking at Ethan, their noses almost touching. There were a few things the Hare had been hoping Ethan had just realized at a time like this but cake hadn’t been among one of those things.

”You were thinking about cake.” Martius said and stepped away from their embrace. ” Well, I suppose it’s bound to be particularly good cake since the twins made it.” He tried hard not to show his disappointment as he followed Ethan back through the door of the cabin. The look Martius shot the twins was one of irritation, as if it was their fault for making the dessert in the first place.

Seeing the twins alone behind the counter, he looked around for Alice and found she was asleep, curled up on a chair in the corner. She always had an innocent look about her but it shone through more than ever. Still, something about her face caught him off guard. Her usual careless smile was gone as it had been last night, and the night before that when they had found her dosing in the dungeon cell. ”She’s such an annoying thing sometimes,” Martius said to no one in particular, ”but I can’t help feeling bad for her. I worry what will happen to her if we don’t get her home quickly. She doesn’t belong here.” Sitting back down on a stool, the Hare waited for the twins to serve him a decedent piece of cake.

[Zitacamron95]

The twins looked up as they had been washing up the table tops when the other two finally walked in, both of their eyes widened with innocence as they got an irritated look from their former boss. They had no idea what they had done wrong, like any other time they had messed up on something, they never really paid attention to what they do wrong long enough to know they did something wrong. In this case, they probably would have never figured it out, they missed that part in their spying, the twins were also known for getting bored way too easy. They weren't sure what they had missed with this whole thing, but it must have not been that bad otherwise they were sure Martius would have yelled at them. They couldn't think of anything that they could have possibly done wrong other than maybe messing up in their cleaning, but they were sure they had done everything right when it came to cleaning up.

"We'll get her home as soon as we can," William assured as he placed a piece of cake in front of Martius and then one for Ethan, "But I'm fairly certain that Wonderland has already left emotional scars in her head, we won't be able to fix those." William then put the cake away, since he was sure nobody was going to want seconds, the cake was rich and sweet, so most people could only handle one peice of it at a time.

"The worst thing that could happen to her right now is getting caught and getting killed, but that just means we'll have to make sure that doesn't happen. Actually, Alice has less of a chance of getting caught, which is good," Leon shrugged, "but you two should be laying as low as possible, even if you changed your appearances, people would figure out who you were. Your faces are too recognizable now, everyone in Wonderland knows Ethan for all the times he's irritated the queen and we're sure wanted posters will be up soon."

"We already know we need to be careful," Ethan sighed, "We'll be fine. You two should get home, you've got to be here bright and early to protect Alice. Oh, and if she decides to go exploring Wonderland, make sure she brings home pain killers."

[Irell Starling]

Chapter 10
I’m Not Myself, You See

The pocket watch snapped open, slammed shut, and then snapped open again jarring the tiny diamonds inside. Jack was waiting in the Queen’s war room, a large rectangular room with one central table and chairs spaced out all around it. He was the only thing white in the entire place. From the floors, the ceilings, to the draperies, to the furniture, to the roses sitting in a large vase in the middle of the table, everything was plastered in red, Sophia’s favorite color. Jack suspect sometimes that if the Queen had her way, he would be tinted red as well.

The door opened as another figure, also not coated in red, walked in. ”You’re late!” Jack snapped at Alexander, ”You’d think for such a brilliant scientists you’d be able to get to places on time.” The White Rabbit hated the Cheshire Cat for no other reason than he had very little say how the man was treated. Jack thrived on power and got endless joy in putting others in their places, which was usually a very easy thing to do since he usually had the ear of her majesty.

In his hand, Jack held the paper file folder Alexander had delivered from the asylum earlier that day. With a toss of his wrist the folder flew across the tabled, sending papers scattering on its way. ”This is utterly useless!” the White Rabbit shouted, ”I had the asylum searched top to bottom and even had the doctor’s secretary tortured but no one’s seen that man since he left a few years back! You’re lucky you’re in the Queen’s good favor, for now, but if you keep coming up with garbage, how long do you think it’s going to last, Cat!” Jack drummed his fingers on the table, all the while sneering. ”Someone’s got to know where they are. It’s not like they can keep hiding Alice forever." The White Rabbit snapped open his pocket watch again and studied the date. "Fortunately for me, it wouldn’t matter in a few day’s time whether we find the girl or not but Sophia's just going to keep getting angrier."

[Zitacamron95]

Alexander yawned as Jack snapped at him, like always, it was nothing new in any shape or form. He was tired of the same thing going on over and over again, nothing ever changed and finally something interesting was going on and Jack was trying to ruin his fun. Cheshire got to watch from both sides to see which one would crack first, it was always so entertaining. Queen Sophia, pissed off to the point that if a servant took a wrong step they would be dead within two seconds, and the queen's rage always pressured her special agents to do a better job, or maybe get killed. It was a delightful time for Alexander, because he had so many things up his sleeves, the queen never dared to kill him, that and there was a secret that both Alexander and Sophia wouldn't dare tell anyone, something that would cause Sophia never to kill him. He didn't have power over the queen, nor did he try, but the secret they kept kept The Cheshire Cat at ease.

Alexander place a hand on the folder, "That's always been your problem, Rabbit, you have no imagination. I gave you a file on Hatter's sessions while in the asylum, if I had wanted you to search the asylum, I would have just told you to instead of going through all the trouble of getting the file," Alexander rolled his eyes as he gathered the papers and put them neatly back into the folder it belonged in, "You see, if you don't start getting a little creative, the queen will have your hide faster than she'll have mine," Alexander looked through the files, though he had already gone through these, he had given quite a few hints as to where Alice was located, but these idiots around here wouldn't be able to see it unless he pointed it out in bold print. There wouldn't be much fun in that though, it was always quite entertaining to see Jack scrambling about to ease the queen's anger. The Cheshire Cat wouldn't give that up even if he would have to get a beating from the queen later.

"You see, if actually read the file, instead of just looking at the surface you'd find plenty of possible places for the Hatter to be. Like maybe he's hiding on one of the streets his family used to live on, or maybe his parents are still alive and he's with them. There's even a possibility that he's being hidden at the cafe he frequented before the death of his friend." Cheshire sighed as he flipped through the files placing those specific papers with those specific details on the table. "Look harder, find something more interesting to look at than that pocket watch."