I don't own Alice in Wonderland or any of its characters. Based on the 2010 Tim Burton film.

Alannah Stayne is borrowed courtesy of the wonderful Ranguvar27! Thank you so much, authoress!

His One and Only Possible True Love

Epilogue

Previously -

Three months later Tarrant was locked away in the White Queen's Dungeons. He had become a babbling maniac. No-one understood what had happened to their beloved Hatter. He was no longer coherent. He was dangerous. He always lashed out at those around him and was forever attempting to run away from everybody.

"Do you think he can be helped?" Alyson sobbed as she and Mirana watched over him one morning. Tarrant was in a straight-jacket and locked securely in a guarded cell.

"I don't know," Mirana said shakily, dabbing at her eyes with a dainty white handkerchief. "I've checked all my tomes, but I cannot find anything to account for this!"

"Well," Alyson said, wiping her nose and blowing daintily into her own handkerchief, "I won't leave him for a moment! He's my one and only possible true love! I'll be by his side forever and ever!"

Inside his tortured mind, the Mad Hatter snapped for good. The Jabberwocky had been right. The only escape from a Mary Sue was death. Mercifully, Underland granted it for him. He vaguely heard Alyson and the Queen cry out in grief as he expired and gratefully floated away, invisible, toward the Land of the Happy of the Happiest Dead.

Present -

Alyson just couldn't accept that Tarrant was dead. And she certainly could not accept that he had committed suicide just to get away from her. Besides, she wondered, what the heck was a Mary Sue? Surely she be no such thing! No, of course not! Not her! She was just a lovely, drop-dead gorgeous and instantly charming to Underlanders but not Abovelanders, teen-aged girl who happened to fall for the Mad Hatter.

So, she did the only thing she could. She sought out the White Queen.

"How can I help you, Champion Alyson?" Mirana asked as she glided, as if on ice, toward the distraught girl.

"Well," Alyson whined, "Tarrant has been gone for a whole day and I just can't live without him! I can't live without my one and only true love, and he certainly must be trying desperately to return to me. I'm his one and only possible true love in the entire Universe. Alice isn't useful to anyone any more but everything is fine now because I'm here."

"And what can I do for you, our fair and perfect Champion?" Mirana asked.

"You know potions, right?"

"Of course," the Queen replied. "But I don't have a potion that can make you forget Tarrant."

"Oh, I don't want to forget him," Alyson said. "I want to take on another Champion's Quest and go and rescue him from the Land of the Dead!"

Mirana paled, which was difficult for her, as she was already almost a pale as a person could be and still be alive.

"There is no such thing, Alyson!" she gasped. "And even if there were, I certainly couldn't allow you to even attempt such a thing! Besides, it is up to the dead to find their way back to the living if they so desire, not the other way around!"

"Well, Tarrant can't get to me!" the girl screeched. "He must be positively miserable. I know that I am, so of course he must be. I have to find a way!"

Mirana sighed. "Champion Alyson, formerly known as Mary Sue Fangirl, there is only one person who may be able to help you. She is the finest potions mistress I know. But even I don't know if she has..."

"Who is she and where can I find her?" Alyson burst out, not caring what else Mirana had to say. Nothing was more important than her own problems.

The Queen sighed. "Her name is Alannah Stayne. She is the wife of Ilosovic Stayne and when he is blessed with time away from certain...hiccups, in Time and Space, he is a decent man and lives a very happy and fulfilled life with her."

"Well, he doesn't deserve to!" Alyson huffed indignantly. "However, if this wife of his can help me either find Tarrant or bring him back, I'll go to here. Where can I find her?"

"I'll fetch you a mount," Mirana said. "He knows the way. But please, do not offend Mrs. Stayne. Treat her with respect."

"Of course," Alyson said. "Now, get me that horse!"

Alyson, at the last moment, remembered the horse's advice and knocked on the door of the Stayne's home. Why that was important she couldn't for the life of her figure out, for her problem was so important that she should have just been able to burst inside and tell the woman what she needed and have it provided for her at post haste!

A surprisingly attractive woman opened the door. Somehow Alyson expected a wife of Stayne's to be plain because he certainly didn't deserve anyone pretty. Or even with two eyes, for that matter. But this woman not only had two eyes, and lovely green ones at that, but was attractive. Her medium-length red hair brushed her shoulders as she nodded and smiled a greeting.

How could a woman know potions better than the White Queen and be...pretty?

"Yes?" the woman asked, a hint of impatience in her voice. "Surely you didn't come here to just gape at me and say nothing?"

"Ah...no!" Alyson said, regaining her composure. "I did indeed come here for a reason. I was told that you could help me with a very special potion."

Mrs. Stayne gestured for Alyson to come inside and be seated at the kitchen table.

"I take it Queen Mirana sent you?"

"Yes. I am Champion Alyson Bella Trueheart. I defeated the dreadful Jabberwocky, restored the White Queen to power, and made Tarrant Hightopp fall madly in love with me." Alyson blushed. "Well, of course he couldn't help it, as we are so obviously made for each other!"

Alannah looked as if she was about to roll her eyes, but caught herself. Alyson looked at her intently. Was this woman actually thinking something she said was ridiculous? Then she shook her blonde locks to clear her head. Of course not! The woman simply didn't understand who she was and how important her request to her would be!

"I need a very special potion," Alyson went on. "I need it at once, for I cannot wait another moment!"

"Of course not," Alannah said indulgently. "Of course the great Champion and the one and only possible true love of Tarrant Hightopp would need her problems solved immediately."

She understood! The wife of the awful and terrible Knave actually understood! Alyson smiled brightly.

"I'm glad you understand how important this is! You see, Tarrant...well...he died."

"I heard," Alannah said sadly. "I heard the news almost as soon as it happened. I doubt that you understand precisely why he died how he did and why, but..."

"He is miserable without me!" Alyson cried out, slamming her hands down upon the table, causing Mrs. Stayne to jump slightly. "He went too far into his madness and simply couldn't find his way back again!"

"Alyson," Alannah said intently, leaning forward and gazing intently into the girl's eyes, "I feel that I must try to make you understand something. Tarrant died because he wanted to. You should, if you truly love him, accept that and let him go."

"No!" Alyson said angrily. "You're wrong! He is miserable without me and he can't be happy anywhere I am not! I need a potion to either bring him back to me or help me to find him!"

"How about one to find yourself? Your true self?"

"I...I beg your pardon?" Alyson asked, placing a perfectly manicured hand over her heart. "My true self? I know my true self! I'm Tarrant Hightopp's one and only true love and he is mine! Can't you just bring him back to me?"

Alannah sighed and leaned back in her chair. "Alyson, please listen to me. I am giving you one final chance to reconsider. Please, think very carefully. Or at least try to. Tarrant died because he wanted and needed to. It is for the best. What you can do is accept reality and try to discover the truth about yourself. If you can do that, perhaps you can be so much more than you are."

Alyson felt a surge of red-hot anger. "I know precisely who I am, thank you, and I don't need to be any more than I am! I am the pinnacle of what I can be! Now, just give me a potion, please!"

"Well, at least you said 'please,'" the potions mistress said with a heavy sigh. Then she smiled brightly. "I have the very thing! Excuse me for a few minutes."

Mrs. Stayne left the room and Alyson thanked her lucky stars that she was going to get what she wanted. She would soon have her Hatter back and he'd be swooning at her feet! He'd make her lovely dresses and hats. They'd return to Court at the palace and be treated like royalty! She'd bear Tarrant perfect babies and she'd keep her stunning figure.

Tarrant would be so grateful to be reunited with her that he'd even move them out of that drabby little house of his and move into the palace! Oh, yes, she had seen some lovely rooms in the palace and she had one in mind. It was...

Suddenly Alannah Stayne appeared with a stoppered vial in her hands.

Alyson leapt to her feet and reached for it, but the woman pulled it away. "Just a moment, Alyson. Are you absolutely sure of this path of yours? Are you certain you don't want to discover the truth of yourself and learn and grow and become a better person?"

"I already said," Alyson began with gritted teeth," that I am fine as I am. I just want the potion and my Tarrant back! I just want my position back at Court and to be recognized at the finest Champion Underland has ever had. I just want what I deserve!"

"What you deserve..." Alannah said, smiling. "Well, you'll certainly get that with this." She held the vial before Alyson and the girl snatched it.

"Just go to the Tugley Woods and drink it beside the stream."

"Why can't I just drink it now?"

"You need the water for it to be...effective."

Alyson completely missed the sardonic smile the woman offered her as she rushed out the door and back to the steed awaiting her.

"Here's the stream, Champion," Louis said, stopping by the edge, but not too close. He hated getting his hooves wet.

"Very well." Alyson dismounted gracefully, quite a feat for a girl who had only ridden a horse several times in her entire life, and walked with the grace of a dancer to the edge of the stream.

"Tarrant, I'm coming! Er...or you are! Or...what the heck! I'll just drink this and see!"

Alyson unstoppered the vial and downed the contents. She gagged and choked for several moments.

Then a voice of Alannah Stayne entered her mind. "You are getting precisely what you deserve, Champion. You deserve to know just what you are, and what you are is a spoiled brat of a girl who thinks far more highly of herself than she should. You didn't appreciate what you had Above and misunderstood your parents. They loved you deeply but you couldn't see any of that because you always wanted more of everything. Nothing they ever did or gave you was enough."

Alyson was stunned. What? Her parents had always found her wanting! Hadn't they?

"And the students you said shunned you, only shunned you after you had treated them as beneath you for years! You didn't even appreciate your beauty. You used it all the while you were growing up to make others feel inferior."

That wasn't true! She had only told a few ugly girls and boys the truth. And only a few times...

"And Tarrant Hightopp is susceptible to girls known as Mary Sues. Mary Sues are girls who think they are perfect for him and unloved and misunderstood in their own world, even though they are perfectly understood and don't appreciate the love they actual do have. After a period of time, Tarrant breaks away from the spell of the dreaded Mary Sues and has to commit suicide to escape them."

"Them?" Alyson cried out, totally ignoring the rest of the statement. "I'm his one and only love! Nobody else! Nobody else, ever!"

"He's had hundreds, child. They all think that they are his one true love. They all have sob stories to tell and they all suffer what they consider the worst tragedies in the world. And they all pursue him shamelessly and try to make him forget his real true love, Alice, who is his wife. As soon as you see the truth of yourself revealed in the stream, he'll pass through the realm of the dead briefly, return to life and to her side. Fairfarren. I hope you learn your lesson, though I have serious doubts."

Alyson looked into the stream. The face of a normal teen-aged girl with blonde hair that did not capture the sunlight in stunning perfection greeted her. Wait...was that a pimple on her cheek?

Alyson screamed. She was plain, and she had a pimple! And her perfect hair was now just ordinary blonde! Oh, what about her...oh, no! Her eyes were no longer spring green, but just...green.

The girl stumbled to the horse and attempted to mount him. She had to get to Mirana right away! The Queen must undo this horrible curse! But Alyson found that she no longer had the grace of a dancer and she couldn't figure out how to mount the beast.

Curses! Where was her grace and poise?

"Ha!" Louis snorted, "or as you Mary Sues would say, ell oh ell!" He sprinted off, stranding Alyson in the Tugley Woods.

"How dare you!" she shrieked after him. "I'm the true Champion of Underland instead of Alice and I'm also Tarrant Hightopp's one and only..."

She stopped as she heard a rustling in the bushes. Glowing yellow eyes met hers and then below them dripping fangs bared themselves.

Alyson, aka Mary Sue Fangirl got just what she deserved.

And everyone in Underland heaved a sigh of relief. At least until the next Mary Sue would come along.

And Alannah Stayne busied herself making potions. She had a feeling that the respite would be brief.