6:00 o'clock, It's Time for Tea
By Tian Lee
The day was quite humid and wet, to say the least. Despite the clear weather Lloyd had hoped for, the sky was heavy with ash-colored clouds that seemed to be squeezing every single drop of its tears.
"What a weather," Lloyd complained, even though there was nobody to reply. He was feeling sour-if it wasn't for the rain, he and the other ninjas-Kai, Zane, Cole, Jay, Sensei, Dad, Nya, etc.-would have been outside, enjoying a picnic under the brilliant sun, like the very image of a family Lloyd had always secretly kept in his mind. But no, the plan was spoiled. All because of the rain. Stupid, stupid rain.
"Lloyd? Lloyd, where are you?"
Lloyd perked up at a voice that was calling his name. Who was it? Kai? No, Cole? No, it wasn't him either….
"If I don't find Lloyd soon, the picnic plan will get late…." The voice continued. Lloyd strained to find the source of the voice, trying to see who it was. And finally, when he rounded a corner, he spotted Zane, looking into another room.
"Lloyd?" Zane called. Realizing that it was Zane the whole time who was calling him, Lloyd walked towards him, calling out a reply.
"Zane, I'm here! What's the matter?"
"Lloyd? Lloyd?" Zane kept calling him, as if he didn't hear Lloyd's reply. Scratching the back of his head as if exasperated, Zane shook his head and closed the door to the room he was looking in.
"I guess he's not here, then. Time to look into the other half of the house." Zane muttered to himself, then walked right past Lloyd, who was about to go mad with impatience.
"Um, Zane? I'm right here? Hello?" Lloyd shouted after the Ice Ninja, but he just kept walking on. It was as if Lloyd's voice didn't even reach his ears. Flabbergasted, Lloyd ran after Zane, determined to make him stop and ask if there is something wrong with his audio system. However, no matter how fast Lloyd ran, he couldn't shorten the gap between himself and Zane, despite the fact that Lloyd was running and Zane was walking. Dumbfounded, Lloyd ran faster, but the gap didn't shorten at all. If anything, the gap only seemed to get wider, which astounded Lloyd even more.
And he was too concentrated to notice that-well, that the things were a little different. That the hallway was a bit too long, that the area around him was getting a bit green, and there was two tiny tips poking out of Zane's hair that looked much like rabbit ears. No, he didn't notice them at all. The only time Lloyd realized that something was a bit off was when Zane suddenly disappeared right in front of his eyes. Shocked, Lloyd darted to the place where Zane was a moment ago, then-
Then he fell down into a deep, dark tunnel that led to who knows where.
The tunnel must have been very long, or maybe it was that Lloyd was just floating down really slowly. He fell down the abyss for quite a while, giving his eyes a chance to adjust to the darkness around him and observe his surroundings. The strangeness of the situation hasn't hit him yet, since he was still quite dazed and befuddled of what was happening around him. As if he was in a dream, everything just felt natural and normal, and Lloyd even got relaxed enough to start wondering.
"I wonder what Kai is doing right now…" He muttered.
"If he was here with me, he would have used his fire power to lighten this tunnel up… Oh, I've been falling for such a long time now. Of course an event like this is nothing compared to what I've been through, but this is certainly peculiar, nonetheless. But it is nice, in a way, just to enjoy and relax, experience something out of ordinary but without the threat of danger. It's been such a long time since I've been so comfortable…"
Lloyd had just begun to doze in the comfort of it all when with a loud CRASH, he landed on the ground. He wasn't hurt at all by the fall, not even a scratch. Which was tremendously nice, since thanks to that he was able to follow Zane immediately after Lloyd saw him out of corner of his eye. Now Zane was wearing a full butler-like suite with a golden pocket watch that ticked and tocked and ticked and tocked. White, furry rabbit ears were poking out of the place where his human ears should have been.
"Zane? Zane! Wait!" Lloyd shouted, thinking that he should make Zane stop, maybe talk to him, even though he couldn't quite remember why. That's right, why should he? Why should he follow Zane when there were so much other delightful things around him-such as the delightful, sunny field of grass just over to the right? It was a perfect place for a picnic; it really was, with the right amount of warmth and sunlight, not to mention cool wind that kissed his cheeks even from this far away. Yes, an enchanting place.
Or he could visit another place, the place on his left. The place looked so dry and empty compared to his right, full of darkness and death, yet there was something compelling to it-something that called to Lloyd.
But of course, he could choose neither of them and just go straight, after Zane. That was the reason he was here in the first place, right? Why he was following Zane Lloyd couldn't remember, but Zane was the reason he was here.
"Which way should I go?" Lloyd wondered aloud, not really expecting an answer.
"One of them is a straight path, the other one is a crooked one, and the last path leads to nowhere." A voice replied. Lloyd jumped slightly, started by the sound, which was soon followed by a light chuckle.
"Hello, Alice." The voice said, still chuckling.
"I'm the Cheshire Cat."
"Uh, I'm- Skylor?" Lloyd shouted in surprise, seeing a familiar face. The voice who just introduced itself as the Cheshire Cat was in fact Skylor, but with pointy cat ears and a twitching tail.
"You're Skylor?" Skylor said dubiously.
"No, you're. I'm Lloyd." Lloyd replied.
"No, I'm the Cheshire Cat. You're Alice."
"You're Skylor. And I'm Lloyd."
"No, you're wrong. I'm the Cheshire Cat and you're Alice."
They went back and forth like this for quite a while, until Lloyd eventually gave up on correcting Skylor-no, the Cheshire Cat, as Skylor seemed to prefer that name.
"So, what were you saying about the three paths? Straight? Crooked? Leads to where?" Lloyd asked after a moment of silence. Skylor only blinked her bright, sapphire-like blue eyes in a very catlike manner and waved her tail in a big S motion.
"Paths are paths. They all lead to somewhere." She replied.
"Yes, but to where?"
"Nowhere."
"But that can't be true. You just said that every path led to somewhere. Nowhere isn't a proper answer to my question." Lloyd sighed, perplexed.
"Sure it is. This is Wonderland, Alice. Anything can happen."
"Wonderland? I thought I was in Ninjago."
"Uh-uh. I have been the guide of Wonderland for many years, but I have never heard of such a land. It seems like the path you're looking for doesn't exist, Alice. And even if it does, it's not a straight line, that's for sure." Skylor yawned, looking very tired.
"Anyway, you should hurry on your path, Alice. If you don't, you'll miss whatever you were chasing. It'll leave you like dust, it will! So hurry child, I'm growing tired."
"My path? But I haven't still chosen-" Before Lloyd had a chance to finish his sentence, Skylor was gone as if she was never there, and there was only one path before him.
And the path was straight. Straight as a ruler.
But Lloyd began walking anyway.
It wasn't long after he had begun walking when he was greeted by the sweet fragrance of tea, similar to the kind Sensei Wu, his Uncle, liked to drink. The entrancing aroma made Lloyd's mouth water, and the fact that he was just beginning to feel thirst didn't help at all. Depending on his nose, the Green Ninja followed the smell like a dog, until his path was blocked by a gigantic rock. When Lloyd looked up, he was greeted by a caterpillar that looked alarmingly similar to Sensei Wu, with a matching set of tea in front of him.
"Who on Wonderland are you?" Caterpillar Sensei asked.
"I don't know." Lloyd replied, not able to think straight due to the wafting fragrance of tea muddling up his brain.
"I thought I did, but I'm not so sure now."
"Well, you must be someone." Caterpillar Sensei sipped his tea.
"Maybe if you changed a bit, then you'll know who you are before you changed."
"But then it's not me that I know. It's my past self I know. I need to know who I am right now!"
"Oh, past is what makes the future, don't you know? That's common logic. But of course, in Wonderland, that logic doesn't apply. Wonderland, such an amazing but confused place. Futures without past exists, and sometimes past happens after the future. Interesting, don't you think?"
"Not interesting, but rather tiring in my opinion." Lloyd sighed.
"May I have a cup of tea that you're having? I am thirsty, very much so."
"You may have, in fact, two cups. One will stretch you. The other will compress you. Chose which one you like better."
And Caterpillar Sensei did give Lloyd two nice hot steaming cups of tea. Lloyd held one in each hand and after he gave his thanks to the Caterpillar Sensei, he moved on his path to who knows where it'll lead.
"I wonder what he means…" Lloyd murmured.
"One will stretch you and the other will compress you. One will stretch you and the other will compress you…well, I won't know what they mean until I try them out, right?"
Right after he said his decision aloud, he took a sip from his left cup. He waited a moment, then two, but nothing seemed to have happened. Rather disappointed, he decided to take a sip from the right cup, but when he looked down, he discovered that his hands were out of sight-all he could see was a green sea-like area under him. And…a neck. A very, very long neck.
"Oh dear." Lloyd chuckled.
"I guess something did happen."
Bending his neck like a snake, he gracefully wove his head under the green sea-like area, which he discovered was trees, in fact. Then, carefully, he took a sip from the right cup, which he immediately felt the effect-now his body was so short his head was literally knocking against his feet.
"Ow!" Lloyd groaned and just barely managed to take another sip from his left cup. After that, he carefully drank the teas until he had controlled his height to seem 'normal'-even if he couldn't quite tell what was normal and what was not anymore. Pleased with his accomplishment, he walked on for some more time, enjoying the pleasant fresh air and delightful scenes of buttered bread butterflies and singing tulips. He had travelled for a while when a strong smell of pepper hit his nose and made him grimace. And not far away, there was a grand house, not big enough to be called a castle or a mansion but grand nonetheless. Evidently the smell of pepper was emanating from the house, which by the way smelled very much like Cole's cooking. In addition, the path Lloyd was following led straight to the house, so Lloyd knocked on the door.
"Good day, sssss-sir." A snake-like man with red, hypnotizing eyes greeted Lloyd as he opened the door.
"How may I help you?"
"I was wondering the path led." Lloyd answered, which the snake-man nodded in understanding.
"Ah, yessssss. For that, you'll need to talk to the Duchesssss. Pleassssse come in."
Following him, Lloyd entered the house, which was thick with smoke and the smell of freshly ground pepper. Thanks to these his eyes became irritated and he began to sneeze consecutively until he reached a cleaner part of the house, where the duchess was waiting.
"Alice-ssss wantssss to talk to you, madam." With a bow the snake-man retreated, living the duchess and Lloyd alone. The duchess wasn't a duchess. In fact, the duchess wasn't a human at all.
"Nice-sss to meet you, Alice-sssss. I'm Pythor P. Chumsworth. Please-ssss take a ssssseat." The duchess smiled and gestured to a chair, which Lloyd gladly took.
"Uh…I'm Lloyd, not Alice. Or, at least I think I'm Lloyd. I'm not sure. I don't know why everybody keeps calling me Alice, but I'm definitely not Alice. And…you're not a duchess."
"Oh my, oh my, what clever eyessssss you have, dear." Pythor chuckled slyly, revealing white, luminous fangs just below the lip.
"You're right. I'm not a duchesssssss. I'm a duke. The truth issssss, that I ate the previousssss duchesss to become the duke, but that old butler hasssss a very bad memory and keepssss thinking I'm his duchessss."
"Oh, so-wait, you ate the duchess to become a duke? I'm pretty sure that that's not the way it normally works."
"Thisssss issss the way it workssss in Wonderland, Alice-ssss. It's about time that you realized that. Anyway, you didn't come thisssss way to ask me about what happened to the duchessss, yesssss? You had another thing to ask about, yessss?"
"That's right-thanks for reminding me. I was wondering what path to go. You know, since the path I was following ends at your house, I don't know where to go anymore. Is there any more paths that I can follow?"
"Ah, there are many pathsssss, but where they lead to dependssss on where you're going."
"Where I'm going…" Lloyd murmured. The smell of pepper has invaded the room now and his eyes were getting irritated again. Rubbing his eyes harshly, Lloyd frowned.
"I don't know where I'm going, actually. I think I was following someone at the beginning. Somebody very….white. But….then I met a cat, and from then I just began following a path. There was only one, so I didn't have to decide. Then I met a caterpillar. It was about then when I started getting confused about who I was. I think I'm Lloyd, everybody just keeps calling me Alice, so maybe I am Alice. Anyway, I continued on, then the path ended at this house and I don't know where to go anymore."
"If you don't know where you're going, why don't you just go back to the beginning and find the person you were following in the first place-sssss? There are only two people that isssss white in Wonderland, sssssso it shhhhouldn't be too hard."
"Who are they?"
"The March Hare and White Rabbit. They're both mad as a hatter, but not as much the Hatter him-sssssself. Since it's not March right now, the March Hare won't be too bad, I presume. But that White Rabbit-there's no cure for that guy. So sssssss-straight and ssssss-stuffy all-year-round, with no sense-ssssss of humor whatsoever! If I were you, I would visit the March Hare first. He's-ssss closer than the White Rabbit anyway."
"Alright. I guess I'll visit the March Hare then. Where is he? What path should I follow to meet him?" Lloyd asked, wondering how did they defined mad people as 'mad' since everything was already quite mad to his eyes, to be frank.
"Before you go, taste some of the pepper sssss-stew my Cook has cooked. He made it just for this-ssss kind of occasion." Duke Pythor clapped his scaly hands together before Lloyd had time to answer, to which the door immediately opened and a man that looked a lot like Cole appeared with a tray. The tray had a bowl of hot, steaming stew on top, completely covered with ground pepper. It looked a lot like one of foods Cole had cooked. Smelled like one, too.
"Uh, thank you for your offer, but since I'm quite busy, I'm afraid that I won't have time t-"
Before Lloyd fully formed his sentence, Cook Cole grabbed Lloyd by his face and shoved the bowl of pepper stew into his mouth.
The last thing Lloyd thought before he lost consciousness was,
I'm never letting Cole cook again when I get back.
When Lloyd regained consciousness, he wasn't in the Duke's house anymore. He was abandoned in the middle of the road at a cross section. There were two paths before him, with two arrows pointing the same way. One read 'To March Hare's house' and the other read, 'to Mad Hatter's house'. But they were pointing the same way.
There were two paths but the arrows were pointing the same way.
How queer, Lloyd thought, but concluded that it was better to follow a path that had some arrows pointing towards it instead of none. With doubts and a bit of curiosity, Lloyd began moving down the path with two arrows. The path was clean and civilized, easy to walk. He walked on for some time, so long so that he was just beginning to wonder if he had made the wrong choice when he heard an out-of-tune, awful singing. It faintly reminded him of the songs Jay sung when he was in the shower.
"Twinkle, twinkle, little bat! How I wonder who you are. The way you-"
"Hello…?" Lloyd called out cautiously. The singing stopped abruptly, which was a relief, and soon Lloyd saw the long, white tea table with various treats and sweetmeats on them, not to mention tea. But there were other drinks besides tea too: milk, chocolate milk, strawberry milk, plain old water, hot chocolate, orange juice, coke, and even a bottle of apple cider. There were two people using the table. One had a pair of long, white ears poking out of his head and was dressed completely in white, save for the electric-blue necktie. He also had reddish brown hair and twinkling sapphire eyes that was full of mischief and perhaps a bit of madness too. The other person was quite dark in comparison, dressed from head to toe in dark bluish suit and a pile of hats sat on top of the head. The face was hidden by the hat, but Lloyd guessed that the person was the Mad Hatter and most likely a man.
"Hey, look who we have here!" The March Hare (Lloyd guessed by the white clothing) crooned and gave Lloyd a crooked smile. Yes, the March Hare looked remarkably like Jay. But by now, Lloyd had given up on trying making head or tails of things that went on, so he decided to just pass the comment and let March Hare be March Hare and Jay be Jay. If that made any sense.
"An outsider, yeah? Not a guest we invited, and not a Wonderlander for sure. Look at that bewildered face! Oh, I seriously want to stuff a handful of biscuits into that guy's mouth."
"Shut up, Hare." The Mad Hatter snapped at March Hare. The Mad Hatter had a surprisingly feminine voice and Lloyd realized with shock that the Mad Hatter was actually a woman, not a man.
"You arrived just in time for tea, Alice. It's 6:00 clock. Let the tea party begin! Where would you like to seat? It doesn't really matter, you know. There are a lot of empty seats."
"Even if he had arrive an hour later for an hour earlier, it wouldn't have made any difference anyway, Hatter. It's always six o'clock since that Queen of Hearts yelled at you for killing Time. Now, the Time doesn't listen to you anymore. What a pity. It would be nice to do something else then a tea party for once."
March Hare complained loudly and munched a plate of pudding, ignoring the glare from Mad Hatter. Lloyd was somehow relieved and surprised by the fact that unlike what Pythor said, the Mad Hatter didn't really seem that, well, mad. In fact, she seemed a lot saner then Jay-no, the March Hare.
"Thank you...er, Ms. Hatter. I guess I'll just take a sip." Lloyd accepted Mad Hatter's invitation and decided to take a sit in the tea party. He was weary and tired by walking all day, getting his body stretched and compressed, and being forced to eat Cole's horrible stew. A nice cup of tea and few minutes of rest will do him good, Lloyd thought.
"What would you like to eat? We have Grey Earl, Black tea, soft, delicate cream puffs and candies too. There's much more than that! Here's a crispy biscuit that might suite your taste, and there's a soft madeleine that is just exquisite! Which one do you like? Each one do you prefer, Alice? We have everything."
Choosing a sit opposite of Mad Hatter, Lloyd was finally able to take a close look at Mad Hatter's face. With short black hair under the hat with red eyes painted with lipstick, the she looked a lot like Nya.
"Oh, thank you, I guess I'll have some of the tea, with a couple of madeleine…thank you…"
Stuffing his face with goodies and food, Lloyd was able to feel happiness and relaxation he wasn't able to feel since he was dropped into his strange world. Maybe it wasn't so bad after all, Lloyd thought.
"Here, have some more of that chocolate chip cookie." Hatter offered.
"Sure, thanks…but I hadn't had any yet! I can't have any more…"
"Sure you can. Since you didn't have 'any' yet, it's really easy to have 'more'."
"Yeah…but…still….Well, what you're saying is true, but it's not grammatically correct."
"Who cares about grammar? Anyway, why did you come here? Not everybody is so eager to join our little tea party."
Sipping his tea, Lloyd shrugged nonchalantly. When the Hatter gestured at him to speak a bit more, he reluctantly opened his lips. It was so comfortable here, he didn't really want to talk…he would much prefer to just rest for a minute more….
"I was looking for somebody. I don't remember the name, but what I do remember was that the person was very white. Pythor said that there were only two white people in Wonderland, which was the March Hare-yes, you, sir-and the White Rabbit. Since the March Hare was closer, I decided to drop by here first and check."
"But why? Why were you looking for that white person?"
"He was the one who led me into here. I followed him down the hole, to the Cheshire cat, and since then I lost him. I didn't know where to go, what path to follow, so I decided to go back to what I was doing at the beginning."
"Hm…is that so…" Taking of her pile of hat off her head, Hatter neatly arranged them into a line in front of her, ordering them in a peculiar way Lloyd couldn't quite grasp. She seemed to be arranging them by the size, then suddenly by pattern, then color, big to small, then small to big. It didn't help that her hands moved so fast it was all he could do to follow them with his eyes.
"So, did you find who you were looking for here?"
"What, me? The person that Alice is looking for is not me. I've never seen him in my life before now! Wait, did I?" Hare scratched his ears as if in deep thought.
"Yep, no. Never saw him before today."
"He's right. He's not the one I'm looking for. His clothes are white, sure, but the person I was looking for was just…white. Not just his clothes, but his whole being." Lloyd agreed to Hare, finishing his cookie.
"Then I guess the one who led you here is the White Rabbit." Hatter concluded, then added under her breathe, "Just as it always was."
"Huh? Excuse me? What did you say?"
"Oh, nothing, nothing. I guess you should go on your way, right? We shouldn't force you to be here. Hurry, go on your way. The path is-that way. If you keep following it, you'll see the White Rabbit in no time." Smiling brightly, Hatter pushed Lloyd out of his seat and back onto the path, ignoring Lloyd's muffled protests and struggles. She was quite strong for a woman.
"But-Wait-I don't-Hey!" Lloyd shouted in exasperation as he found himself back onto the road, a half full cup of tea in one hand and buttered bread in other.
"But it was so nice over there…." Sighing sadly, the green-eyed boy threw one last wistful look at the way the tea party was and began walking on the road once more.
Far away, in the wind that blew over the forest, Lloyd thought he heard the sound of off-tune singing.
In a castle not very far away, where the road was stained red with petals of roses that drank the blood of the dead, a Queen dressed in red stood above all the other, seeing everything and all-knowing. The Queen's hands played with the soft hair of the King's blond head on the lap, asleep.
"Stay asleep, Your Majesty," The Queen whispered.
"Keep dreaming, My King."
A/N: Hello everybody! A new fanfic in a long time! This will be a two-part story. I'm sorry if the story was quite unorganized, since when I was writing this, I was running low on energy and everything kind of got jumbled up in my head. I accept critiques so please review what you thought about it!