Alice lounged on her bed, bored and tired. In front of her, a small notepad with scribbled characters lay on the bed. They were the characters of Wonderland that she remembered so fondly. Foremost on her mind was Hatter, than the Jabberwock, and then March... All people who she remembered, all people she wished she could have once again by her side.
She missed Jabberwock's fatherly, warm touch, even his sudden tamtrums; March's joking attitude and funny, long ears; and then... Hatter.
Sighing, she sat up, flipped the notebook with the crude caricatures of her missed ones slowly. Alongside those first three were the Cheshire Cat, the White Rabbit, any drawing that you could open a copy of 'Alice in Wonderland' and 'Through the Looking Glass' to find.
Although her drawings were worse in the certain 'artistic' viewpoint.

She stood, glanced at her watch, froze, and then rolled her eyes, "Geez! I'm late!"

Grandmother's house was still dusty as ever, rather bag for one solitary old lady to be living in.

"Grandma? I'm here..."

"Got your bags, honey? Didn't forget your pajamas like last time, did you?"

"No, Grandma..."

"Oh, I'm making some cake too... Why don't you go get yourself roomed in, Alice? I'll call you down when it's ready."

Alice nodded, went upstairs. However, her mind was on other matters than 'spending the night at Grandma's' house. She hurried to the guest room, threw her bag in there, and then pratically sprinted up to the attic.
There, in all of its unknown glory, was the aged grandfather clock. Its hands inched to the right slowly, a bit off time, a bit off key. She could hear the tick, tick, tick of the gears rotating inside when she listened for it. Alice ran over, yanked open the clock's glass door, peered inside. Only two weights on fine chains, swinging slightly. She sighed, closed it slowly. She had been checking for the last two years, checking every time she went to Grandma's to see if the portal to Wonderland had opened again.
Apparently, it hadn't.

Sighing, she turned around, exited the attic.

Alice unpacked her things slowly, folding up scrunched-up clothes and stuffing them into a drawer. A weekend with Grandma. This would be fun. Grandma would probably take her to the bookstore again and she'd be able to buy her much-needed copy of 'Edgar Allen Poe's Short Stories'. She had lost her previous copy and it was her favorite collection of short stories...

"Alice! Cake's ready!" called Grandma.

Alice smiled faintly, started for the door. Suddenly, a crash echoed out from upstairs. Stopping, Alice glanced up before her heart quickened.

Upstairs. The attic.

When Alice slowly peered into the attic, she gazed at the clock, curious. Nothing was different, nothing had changed about it.
However, about five feet to the right was a mirror which had fallen,miraculously unbroken.
Alice walked in, moved silently towards it. The air of the attic was warm, moist even, which was unusual.
Something was different.

She nudged the edge of the looking glass with the tip of her shoe before bending. Grabbing it by the false gold frame, she lugged it up, glanced at the surface, and froze before hurriedly propping it up against a box.

Where her reflection should have logically been, Hatter stood, facing her, face questioning and searching. His black hair contrasted sharply with his pale white face and his crisp crimson overcoat. Atop his head sat a rather battered old top hat, one that had obviously seen better days.
Besides him fidgeted March. Long, gray ears flopped around wildly, whiskers quivered, and eyes widened gleefully. Unlike Hatter's rather normal, somewhat dressy clothes, he had the same dented armor that Alice had become so familiar with during her last trip to Wonderland.Turning, he pointed at Alice excitedly, only succeeded to smash the tip of his finger painfully against the glass. He let out a silent yelp, one that Alice didn't hear, and sucked on his finger sullenly. He was pressing his other furry hand against the glass. Alice could see the see the bottom of his paw squished up against it.
Behind the two was an empty room that she could easily say was in the main Wonderland castle.
Hatter gazed at Alice through the glass before smiling sharply.

Alice heard was whispers, familiar but distant still. Hatter came up to the glass, began pushing steadily against it. March joined him. Alice just stared, ecstatic, elated, and a bit confused at the same time. Why didn't they just try the clock?

Suddenly, Hatter and March tumbled through the glass, sputtering loudly as they hit the ground in front of Alice. Hatter, on the bottom, groped blindly for his hat, March disoriented on top of his back. Glancing around with bleary eyes, he latched them on Alice, smiled toothily, and then bounced up to bless her with a friendly hug, "Alice!"

"M-March!" Alice could barely pronounce the simple word.

Hatter found his hat finally, crushed under his chest, sighed, popped it into a shape that could be called only roughly cylinder, staggered up, and then shoved March out of the way to crush Alice in his arms. "Alice, I've missed you! You didn't come back!"

"I've been trying!" Alice warmly returned the embrace, hearing the sniffles in his voice, "'Cept the clock won't let me through!"

"Oh. Yeah... about that... We've been sort of closing off the Time realm..."

"Why?"

March interjected hurriedly as Hatter's face grew a furious red, "Well... There's been problems with your father... You know? Or should you just guess?"

"Jabberwock?"

"Yes..." hissed Hatter angrily, his yellow shadowlander eye turning into to black as his green one glittered dangerously. "He's an obstinate monster." He fell silent for a moment before forcing a grin, clapping an arm over Alice's shoulders, tugged her close against his chest, and whispered, "So... This is your world. Show us around, maybe? That'd be nice before we had to go back."

March punched him playfully in the shoulder, "You're just trying to get out of meeting your father."

"Hey... He's going to be checking up on my diet and... I know! I just know he's going to find out I've been cheating!" Hatter scowled before pushing Alice out of the attic in front of him.

March followed them, shrugging happily, "Well... You know I have to tell him."

"Yes. 'For my own good'..." Hatter chuckled somberly before stopping, gazing stupidly at the overhead light, "What the heck is that?"

Alice sighed. Coming from the seventeenth century or eighteenth century or whatever this century of the twisted past they had come from, they wouldn't even know what electricity was. "It's... uh... trapped lightning. A... torch."

March and Hatter stared at it before March asked quietly, "A torch of lightning... Okay! Next thing!" He bounded forward, excited to see what else Alice's world had to offer, the chain mail clinking like keys as he raced into a room.
The bathroom.

Alice was about to follow him, having an uncertain belief that he would think of the toilet as a bowl of water or something of the like, when Hatter pulled her back, tapped a finger on her nose. "So... Have you missed me?"

Alice stared up in his hopeful eyes and admitted, "Yes."

"A lot."

"Yes."

Hatter licked his lips, bared his sharp teeth in a smile. Letting his hand slide down the side of her face, he whispered, "You have no idea how tempted I've been to come through the last three months."

Instantly, Alice stiffened and sputtered, "Three months? I've been back two years."

"Oh!" Hatter's eyes glinted happily. "That means you're... let's see. Seventeen now, right? Perfect age for marrying. I have a ring for you. I melted down my locket to make it. See?" Teasing a small chain from underneath his jacket, he pulled out a small circle of gold.

Alice stared stupidly at it. She could remember how overly protective of that locket he had been. He had... melted it? For her? "Well... thank you..."

Hatter's smile grew wider in satisfaction and he hugged her lovingly, "Anything for you. So, should we marry? We'll live in Wonderland and have such a lovely family."

Alice felt her blood run cold even though his embrace was warm. So he was also still set on marrying her in a slightly creepy and obsessed way. The very thought sent shivers down her spine."Um..."

March bounded out of the bathroom, wide-eyed. "Hatter! What are you waiting for? C'mon!"

Hatter released Alice, took her hand, and tugged her after March, smiling, eyes glazing as they travelled to some imaginary scene off in the distance. Alice pursed her lips, regarded his face. It seemed more relaxed since the last time she had seen him. "So... how's... 'Father'?"

Hatter paused before scowling, "Still alive, unfortunately. Now he has all of the Shadowlands under his rule, and he's been trying to send regiments of soldiers through Time's domain to come through and kidnap you back to him. And... Time basically had, well... still has his own little war going in there. We helped, not that he needed any. He has all these creepy little gear monsters that-" Hatter let go of Alice's hand, meshed his fingers together, stared at them, and then cracked the knuckles, "Let's just say they're really, really, really hard to kill. So Time had banned travel through his land, not that it stops White. White had special permission and he's still extra careful."

"He's been trying to get me back?"

"There's something like five reports of it anyway. Well, if you're actually asking how the Jabberwock is doing... I would say he's starving himself, nearly suicidal. He's threatened to kill himself, you know, so the militaries and all those other branches are doing everything they can to get to you."

Alice stopped and gaped, "He's going to kill himself?"

"Either by starvation or the sword. He hasn't really eaten anything for three months, unless you count that one imagination fury he went into. You know... When he goes and tries to eat everybody's head." Hatter glanced curiously at a clock before asking, "That's a very, very, very small clock. Where's the pendu-"

"Alice! You brought friends?" came Grandma's thrilled voice. "You could have warned me! I'd have baked more cake." She giggled.

March called up, "Hatter! Get your sorry butt down here! There's cake! And weird things that make the cake!"

After a few hours of just exploring the house, Hatter and March decided together that it was time to return to Wonderland. Each grabbing Alice up by the arm, they towed her up the stairs and down the hall.
Alice said weakly, "Don't I get any say in this?" Inside, she was the happiest a girl could have been. She was going back to Wonderland!

"Uh, no." said March.

"And March is going to be late for May's little dinner party as it is." remarked Hatter, pulling a golden pocketwatch from his coat's pocket, glancing at it, and then sighing. "And father will be sure to be angry that we've brought Alice back."

"We can just tell him that we did it to make sure Jabberwocky wouldn't get her."

"Or that she and I are engaged." Hatter stopped for a moment before happily saying, "Let's go with that one!"

March shook his head, sniffing, "Nah... You'll want to carry it through as it is. So... Safety." They entered the attic.

Hatter glanced at the mirror with hesitation, hand straying up to his top hat, before he asked, "Can I be in back this time?"

"Why? So you can save your top hat or fall on top of Alice?"

"Both."

Alice grimly stared at the mirror. They were acting like she wasn't even here, as was the usual way they did things. "I can hear you, you know."

"Yes, we know, and-"

Suddenly, the grandfather's clock door slammed open. Out stumbled a bleeding Shadowlander, panting, eyes mad and feverish. Seeing Alice, he smiled softly before whispering in his native language, "The princess!"

Hatter snarled, shoved Alice into the mirror, "How'd the heck he'd get through?"
Alice felt as if she was falling into ice. Her skin numbed, her eyes froze. She thought she'd be only an ice cube when they reached Wonderland when she staggered out onto the floor of Wonderland's capital castle.