Insomnia
Disclaimer: Alice in Wonderland and all its characters are owned by Lewis Carroll, or Charles Dodgson.
-X-
There had been a critical point after Alice's leave from Wonderland that had made the Queen want to chase after the girl, decapitate her, and then have a new crown made of Caucasian human skin and golden hair, of course pointing out the fact that her Royal Highness was a brunette.
She had convinced herself that in order to do that, she needed to leave Wonderland too, and really believed that it was possible.
When the King heard of this, he immediately rushed to his darling's side and told her that she would have an Alice crown, and she could even skin it herself, if she had wanted. But there was no need to leave Wonderland, he cooed and cooed again.
Still, Her Royal Highness wasn't satisfied.
Stories spread.
The Mad Hatter had commented with a horrifying laugh, that the idea was so stupid it might actually work.
The Caterpillar said it would.
The Cat said it will.
Alice, amidst the entire conundrum unknowingly going inside the right side of her brain, was troubled.
Though troubled as a 15-year-old should be.
If only Gina Hitchbottoms would stop taking her lunch everyday, and if only the boys at school would stop harassing her and calling her a wench for having tripped and flashed her underwear at class this afternoon, then maybe she could stop waking up with hiccups going off her throat and wet tear streaks trailing at her cheeks.
She couldn't sleep. She didn't know why. Was that why?
And then one night, tonight precisely, she woke up with a frightful scream and a splitting headache that wanted to crack itself open.
She thrashed wildly at her bed, falling off at her floor. She banged her knee at the hard, wooden dashboard, a purple bruise forming at the center. Her hands grabbed fistfuls of her hair and tugged at it and pulled at it and screamed unmercifully, rolling and rolling and rolling around because her head hurt so much. Tears burst out of her eyes, uncontrollable. The pain was drowning her.
Her fingers writhed at her sides as her body lashed around the room, knocking things over. Her legs kicked wildly at her rug, then at the foot of her bed, bashing it repeatedly.
Something was coming out. It hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts!
She wailed, desperately wanting it to end. And then she started sobbing and shaking and laughing and screeching manically all at the same time.
It was tugging at her head. Let me out, let me out now! It snarled. Her neck was jerking upwards.
A pierce throbbing was cutting open at the top of her head. Her arms collapsed, the feeling of her brain was on fire. And when she had finally thought that she was going to die, it all stopped abruptly as it had begun.
She fell to the side with stinging numbness, the feeling of soft, prickly needles penetrating her. Her nerves screamed silently.
It's okay, it's okay, it's okay. It ushered. Alice's eyes angled her room with fright, panicked, looking for the voice. Anything. Where...?
It continued, speaking so delightfully that she was almost convinced it wasn't a monster. The whispers circled her mind, persuasive, like a solemn, broken song. You're fine, you're fine, you're all right. I'm out now, you see? She closed her eyes tightly, hiccuping. Her legs curled up to her chest, and she wrapped her stiff arms around them for a false sense of security.
Her heart beat was racing.
B-bmp… B-bmp… B-bmp… B-bmp... B-bmp...
But that wasn't hers.
Alice wept, scared, but she forced herself to listen. Her pupils were blurry from her tears, though she searched her room. Nobody was there.
She checked again.
A mistake.
There he was.
A boy with cat-like yellow eyes and slit pupils, a pale complexion, and… and pink… hair—?
He… he was materializing by the second!
"That's not a very lady-like posture you have there," He greeted.
Alice shrieked, sitting up in horror.
The boy, with his now fully solid hands, suddenly grabbed Alice and covered her mouth, muffling her shrieks for help.
"Easy, love." He said, purring a bit. "We don't want your parents running here right now."
"Mmm-hm mmm Mhmm!"
"Pardon?" He took his hand off her mouth.
"W-who are you...?" She stuttered, eyes wide and uncertain. Feeling what the boy had said was true, she straightened up immediately, tucking a stray hair behind her ears and looking up at him from her lowered gaze, tasting the saltiness of the tears that ran past her lips.
The boy's head and arms were the only things visible of him. The other missing body parts were still constructing themselves, like tiny little atoms sewing each other one by one. He was like a floating cherub, only perhaps more devilish.
She stared at the small, fizzy particles, and in a daze, ran her fingers through it. He slapped her hand away.
"I see you still have your morbid curiosity," He drawled.
"Not really," Alice answered, her usual self more quiet but strong-willed. "I only ask essential questions now."
He didn't say anything, only narrowed his eyes. The upper part of his body, his neck, shoulders, and his chest were now beginning to form.
Alice stared at him more thoroughly, as if she had just been granted access.
She leaned forward, eyebrows knitting in hesitated seriousness. "W-who are you?" Her voice tried to sound demanding, only to come out terrified and small.
He looked up at her, eyes meeting. "S'not really the most essential question to ask, is it, sweetpea?" The nickname rolled out of his lips like water slipped off ducks.
"Don't call me that." She snapped all of a sudden, angry that he was being so familiar with her when they didn't even know each other. The swift look in his glinting, yellow eyes begged to differ. Then it was gone. Then it was back again. "Stop it." Alice hissed. "Why're you asking me?"
"Asking who?"
"Stop deliberating, cat!"
The girl's eyes widened in shock, realization immediately hitting her in the face like a ton of bricks. She stared at him, hands flying to cover her mouth.
Cat didn't grin. "I expected it'd at least take you days."
"No you didn't." She whispered softly, almost confident that he didn't expect anything because he already knew everything. She fought hard to block the rising terror in her throat, ready to scream and shriek once the numbness settled out.
The real Alice was lost. Still shocked that he was there right now. Still couldn't believe that this was happening to her.
Cat stared, taking in her almost traumatized expression. "I suppose you're right." He contemplated.
"No I'm not." She said quickly, almost carelessly. If this was true, then she had learned that agreeing with him wasn't really the smartest thing to do back in Wonderland, if you did want to be smart. "I mean, I don't know, since you're the one who—"
Cat flashed the girl a malicious look. "Stop it,"
His knees were now fully solid too.
"But how..." She gave him a panicked stare. "I... I don't understand. H-how did you…? Why…?"
Alice suddenly stopped talking and closed her eyes tightly, counting to ten. This isn't real, this isn't real. Snap out of it you delirious girl! She thought crudely, and opened her eyes again. She let out a loud sob when his face didn't disappear.
"Please. Please, please tell me that I'm not dreaming." She wept, mumbling through her tears. "I can't bear to go to that place ever, ever again." Her breath shivered, and she glanced at him with crying eyes.
"Why not?" His question was innocent enough. Pfft. Not really. Cat's head tilted to the side, ready to fall off.
"Because this is what happened to me after I did."
"What happened?" His ears twitched, as if they were still cat ears.
She looked down at the carpet. "I'm not sure." She answered in all honesty, looking at him. "That's the problem."
Honestly, if you had even bothered to ask her, her life was fine. Far from fine, in fact, it was normal to the point of dull. It was safe too, nonetheless. She was fed. She was schooled. She was clothed. But Alice still felt uneasy.
Silent tears fell. Drip, drip.
"No, you're not dreaming." The boy confirmed with a fast blink. He wasn't one to blink much, though.
"This is real then?" She hiccuped, now calming down.
"If this is what you'd call reality—" He cut himself off. "Yes. Entirely. This." He did a complicated gesture around her room.
"But I don't want it to be real, either." She whined childishly, her wet face slipping into delicate fingers.
"And I suppose you have a very good reason for this."
Her face hardened. She looked at him.
"I don't want to go among mad people."
Cat's eyes narrowed. He stared at her very, very seriously. "But we're not mad, Alice. At least, not anymore."
Alice bit her tongue from saying anything else.
She stayed silent, her eyes refusing to look at his until she chose her words carefully. "It was painful, when you came out of my head..." She said, hoping to break the tension with a joke, though he didn't bother replying to her.
Alice sighed. "You don't grin any more, Cat." She said, observing him cautiously when he didn't reply.
His golden eyes looked at her.
"In fact, you haven't grinned since you got here." She recalled, thinking.
Her words were childish. Child-like. She replied by taking notes on his behavior. She didn't understand the importance of his words.
We're not mad, Alice. At least, not anymore.
"You used to be rather talkative." She added cheekily, carelessly. "You couldn't shut up—"
It only took a moment before she had finally caused him to snap.
"It's because you don't ask any more questions." He spoke angrily, eyes flashing. "Why?"
"I forget to." She answered lamely.
"Wonderland is fading." Cat hissed. "And I don't mean that in some sort of idiotic metaphor."
She blanched at his words, though grew as indignant as him. "So what if Wonderland is fading?" She said coldly, staring at her wall. "I don't like it there anyway. Isn't that what matters most?"
Cat paused. What mattered most? Well, he's never thought of it that way before.
His anger dissipated almost instantly. "If that's the way you see it." Cat left off, thinking. He wasn't one to blab out answers.
Alice shut her eyes tightly, tuning him out. Forgotten scenes played inside her mind like a deck of cards. Swish, swish, swoosh.
"If Wonderland's fading, then you can stay here for a short period of time." She decided finally, after a few seconds. She glanced back at his serious expression, then winced. It didn't quite match.
"And then you jump back in, alright? I'll build a new one. Something I like."
Cat merely stared at her, raising a brow.
Help me, help me, help me.
"Cat," Alice whispered in the darkness.
"What?"
"Are you awake?"
"I'm speaking to you, aren't I?"
"Then what're you doing?"
"Reading."
"There's no light."
"S'not a problem."
"Hey. You're not talking in riddles anymore."
There was a shuffling of pages, and a moving of a limb. She was met with cool silence.
Alice clicked her tongue, her eyebrows coming together. She pushed her luck when she decided that she wouldn't be satisfied without a reply. "Cat."
"What?"
"You're still not grinning, either."
He didn't answer. His lips parted. Instead, "Alice?"
"Yes?" She caught hold of his glowing eyes, eerily yellow in the night.
"Sleep."
Alice awoke the second time that night, screaming horribly.
Yellow irises turned to her in the dark.
She didn't care. She placed her head at her hands and wept, her hair curtaining around her.
Cat turned to his book once again. For a questionable moment, he thought that his predictions were wrong. He thought with an awful frown that they might've found an exit out earlier than expected. That just wouldn't do.
The girl was only crying, though.
"Do you do this every night?" He asked out of idle conversation.
"Yes. I hate sleeping." She answered softly, catching a tear. You won't wet my pillow this time. She sniffed, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand.
"Hmm." Cat thought. "How do you replace the gallons of tears you waste?"
"I drink a lot of water."
"Huh." He murmured, flipping a page. "You can die from that."
Alice wept more.
Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
Something was reciting it to her in a melodic voice.
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Alice turned around. Thousands upon thousands of flowers littered the fields, all singing quite frenziedly for a lullaby.
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun!
The sky turned dark. The clouds turned gray, hanging low.
The frumious Bandersnatch!
A beast formed out of the shadows, its neck extending. It reached into the garden, ripping and eating the flowers with its many jaws. The colorful flowers all shouted with glee, singing and dancing and laughing and pulling her along towards them, their eyes turning dirty black and their petals wilting as she kicked and screamed, pulling at the grass and at the flowers. Then—
Then, inevitably, tears started to fall.
Alice's eyes snapped open. She sat up on her bed, her forehead shining with sweat before she immediately started to sob again. Her breath came out in quick, sharp gasps as if she was hurt, her frame trembling uncontrollably in the dark.
Cat's head cocked up, stirring away from his sleep. The remnants of the girl's soft crying and whimpering broke through his ears, forcing him to wake up.
"Cat?" Her voice shook, weeping.
He didn't try to suppress the annoyance in his tone. "Yes?"
"Distract me. Hurry."
He rolled his eyes. "A nameless boy killed them. Its a happy ending."
"… H-how did you know that?" Alice's sobbing had eased, just enough for her to look up at him in suspicion.
"Know what?"
"That I was having that nightmare... The flowers... and... and the lullabies, the monster—! Happy ending? You knew, didn't you!"
"That you were dreaming?"
"Nightmare!" She corrected exasperatedly.
"Nightmare what?"
"Oh, Christ." Alice sniffled.
Cat gave her a sparing glance. "In any case, since you're awake and all, you might as well listen."
"Go on," She continued miserably.
"They're all coming. Wonderland is fading, and I'm not the only one who wants to escape."
Alice had been droning off, not really paying attention. Then she paused, blinking when it occurred to her that what he said actually made a little bit of sense.
She rose out of the covers. "What!?"
"Hmm?"
"Cat— Cat! What did you say?"
"I asked you if tuna would taste better if it was dipped in milk."
"No! Not that, the other one!
"No? I thought it'd taste a whole lot better."
"Cat, please." Alice broke out into a sob, her breath hitching. "Tell me, tell me. I don't want to go there again. I don't... I don't..." She cried, shoulders trembling as she buried her face into her hands, weeping softly.
Cat stayed silent, his golden eyes never leaving her face.
It hurts, it hurts, it hurts.
Its fine, its fine. You're okay, you're alright. I'm out now, you see?
A/N: Edited. Alice is now 15 instead of 14, as I realized 14 was too young.
