I woke up in the woods. I didn't even know how I got there. The last thing I remembered was walking, somewhere important, and I fell. I just remember falling and that was it. As I sat up, I heard an earsplitting screech; which scared me plenty,
"You! Girl! Come here! You're gonna be eaten by the Jabberwockey!" quietly exclaimed an awkward fellow with the name "DUM" embroidered on his collar.
"Jabberwockey? What's that? What are you, and who's that?" I replied while I pointed at a similar looking fellow, but he had "DEE" on his collar. "NO time for this!" yelled Dee as he grabbed my hand, helped me up, and him, Dum, and I began to run. This was no ordinary run however, this was the fastest I had ever run in my life. Somehow we started running twice as fast, then 4 times that, then even 10 times that! After a long 10 minutes, we arrived at a very rickety house. It looked like it was blackened by fire, but not touch enough to be burnt to the ground.
"So now can one of you PLEASE explain what's going on?" I exclaimed impatiently.
"Well, what would you want to know?" inquired Dee.
"Everything! What are you? What is this place? Where am I? Why are we at this house? What IS a Jabberwockey?!"
"Well my dear, I am Tweedledee, he is Tweedledum, and we are wasting time because we still need to have tea!"
"WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT! WHY AM I HERE! AND WHAT ON THIS EARTH IS A JABBERWOCKEY!"
`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.
"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!"
He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought -
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.
And, as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!
One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.
"And, has thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!'
He chortled in his joy.
`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe."
"well that was, uh, interesting?" I said very puzzled. Quite frankly, I hadn't understood a word of the poem Dum had just recited.
"Shoot! The front door's locked! We're gonna have to go through the basement!" shouted Dee; since it was very hard to hear over the cries of people in the next town over, and the roaring and screeching of this Jabberwockey thing. He opened a really small door that seemed to just rise from the floor. Somehow, we all fit in this odd hole. It was more like a tunnel, in fact. Right when we went through it, all we did was fall; for what seemed like hours. (Although later Dum told me it was only for a couple of seconds.) There was something that just struck me about this place, I couldn't put my finger on it. It all was just so, mad.
All of a sudden, I hit the floor with a stinging SMACK! Dee and Dum brushed themselves off, since they were covered in dirt. I was too, but I didn't mind that much. AS I looked around the basement, it was just a room. No windows, no stairs going up, and no stairs going down. The tunnel was gone too. We were just trapped; trapped in this dark room with no way out. What did Dee get us in to?
"Rose! Rose!" Dee called, but nothing answered; nothing moved. Who is this Rose character? I thought. I started to walk around looking for a way out, and just like that I tripped over something. Wait, this wasn't a something; this was a someone! My eyes started adjusting to the darkness now, and I could see it was a girl. She had blonde hair and was wearing a blue dress. One of those dresses that look like a grandmother made it. Dee and Dum started calling for me, and this Rose character. I made the connection that this girl I tripped over was indeed Rose.
"Are you Rose?" I whispered to her, but no answer. All she did was stare at the wall. "Hey, I'm talking to you!" I whispered again while shaking her, but she wouldn't budge. I stared in the direction that Rose was, and everything started spinning; so much that I had to sit down. Then I saw a rabbit, he wasn't spinning, though he was all I could see.
You must not be late, you must not be late. He kept repeating. He didn't say it outright; it was like it was in my thoughts. It was in my ears, in my head, in my everything. I couldn't even hear my self think, was I even myself? His thoughts had replaced mine. I tried opening my mouth and calling for Dee and Dum, but I just COULDN'T. I had no control over myself. All I could do was sit and stare. Out of nowhere, I smelt this smell. It was probably the best smell I had ever smelt in my life. It must have helped me get out of the trance I was in, because just then I was able to here Dee and Dum, but it sounded off in the distance and very faint. All I did was focus on their voices. Everything stopped spinning, and I could speak and think again. Now I was fine, standing with Dum and Dee, who were yelling awfully loud.
"IS all this yelling really necessary?" I asked as politely as I could, though it came out terribly rude.
"YES!" Dee exclaimed, "Help us wake up Rose!" AS they screamed for Rose, I shook her, and eventually he came to.
"Where, where am I?" Rose asked quizzically.
"You my dear, are not where you think." We heard a voice say from above as we all saw a light shine from a doorway that opened up. That might've been the happiest I have ever felt to see a light and a doorway. Dee and Dum started walking toward the doorway, as a doorway appeared. Naturally, we all up it. When we walked up the stairs, we stumbled into a dining room that looked like it was out of a 1920's about high class citizen's houses. Dum started panicking greatly, "No, not here, not now, we must leave im-" Dum started to say, then was at a loss of words when Rose fainted. They had all been here for before, except me. "We're fine here," Dee started, "They're both still a bit shaken up, come sit down, we'll be having tea anytime soon," Dee directed at me as we all walked to the table and sat down; I felt bad just leaving Rose there, but hey I was starving! Just then, I smelt that delicious smell again; it was croissants! They were just lying on the table! Every type of croissant you could imagine! Then, tea appeared out of nowhere. Not just any tea; mint tea! My favorite! Dee and I sat down across from each other and drank and ate merrily, while Dum was kneeling next to Rose trying to wake her. Dee had made sure to drink from the purple tea pot, instead of the pink one he had insisted I had drunken out of. "Mint's not my type," was his excuse. It was a little fishy though. I mean, who doesn't like mint tea? A top hat appeared at the head of the table as if out of thin air. It was purple felt with a green ribbon around it. Then right under it, a man appeared! "Our final guest has arrived!" Dee shouted happily while jumping up and down; he was as giddy as a little kid going out to ice cream.
"Why are we all here?" I said impatiently.
"You, my dear, are not in wonderland. This isn't a place where everything goes your way. We here in this place, we've changed. Pain, it changes people. It makes even the happiest souls turn into cold-hearted and mean. I used to be like you and Rose. Happy about life, happy about living, but after the Jabberwockey and the Red Queen took over this place, and took away my hat shop, and even my wife, I was hurt. It's pain; the pain of losing, the pain of heartbreak. It eats you from the inside-out. You're gone. You're empty. You're defeated. You feel the only way out is to put suffering on others, and that's exactly what I'm doing with you and Rose. This isn't wonderland, this is hell. We're all mad here." As the Mad Hatter said this, Dum did something courageous. He forced tea into the Mad Hatter's mouth and his brothers, and then he drank it himself. I started to feel weird, and the whole room got dizzy. Dee started to chase Dum, but soon fell. "YOU FOOL! WHAT HAVE YOU DONE!?" screamed Dee. That was the last thing I heard as a blacked out.
I woke up somewhere, and I wasn't sure where I was, again. I wasn't the same anymore, everything had changed. I looked down and all I saw were petals and stems. I was a tiger-lily to be exact. Rose was a rose, obviously. Dum had become a huge bush, like a protector to us and all the other flowers. Dee and the Mad Hatter were both thorn bushes, entangled in each other. The Mad Hatter had so much creativity; so much intelligence. It was wasted away. His mindset changed by pain. He was right though, pain does change you. Sometimes, into a better person, and other times, your worst fear.