Another Ten Years

This is not the Wonderland you think it is. It's not like in the books you've read. The flowers do not sing, the Queen of Hearts is not here, the Mad Hatter does not have any tea parties, and I am to sane for my own good. This isn't even the Abyss. This is a dimention created because she found her memories. True, the horrid Red Queen of Hearts, more well known as the Will of the Abyss or Alyss, was killed many year's ago, but Wonderland hasn't gotten better since that time. Alice had been the one to kill Alyss, then she just up and left. Since Alice left, no one has aged, no one has smiled, and no one has forgotten her. What has it been now? Ten years? Surely Alice has aged unlike us. If that's the case, then she is about my age now; some where in her mid-twenties. But just thinking about it makes me sad. When Alice left, she took a part of me with her. I haven't whispered even a word since that day. No one, not even the Hatter, also called Break (when he comes to try and kill me), has managed to make me speak. But our current state of life is all my fault! If I hadn't stopped saying riddles, then every one could find some way to be happy! If I hadn't tried to hide Alice and Alyss from their memories from the start, not much would have changed! I'm supposed to know close to as much as the Four Dukes, but they would kill me if I approached them for help. We never make friends, since so many Chains are killed by the unkillable Chains that have evolved into our world. Wonderland is supposed to be a part of Alice, so she must be regretting some thing alot if these monsters keep showing up more frequently. But I haven't seen a single demon yet all day, this worries me some how.

I take to the trees, though they are dead and bare. For some reson, no matter how hard I try, I haven't been able to turn invisible since Alice left. I climb through these dead trees, my hands and feet swiftly moving from one branch to another. That's right, I look different now. I'm still a Chain in a way, just more human. I actually eat like a human and get sick like them, too. When Alice left, I found a ribbon-like peice of her coat stuck to some thorns. To this day, it remains tied to my wrist like the bell around my neck. It's the only thing that keeps me beleiving that Alice was actually here, in this dimention.

While I was distracted with these thoughts, my hand missed a branch ever so slightly and I came crashing to the rocky ground with a loud thud. I groan out in pain as blood seeps out through a gash in my leg, the blood beginning to pool out around me. At this rate, I will die in an hour. As the rusty metallic smell of my crimson blood reaches my nose, I see a figure off in the distance. If it is one of my old friends that I had made when I found myself in this dimention, then they may be able to help me at least die in comfort. I try to call out for help, but instead a blood chilling yowl bursts from my mouth. My vision blurs as the figure begins to quickly move toward me. "Oh my!" a female voice exclaims as the person stoppes infront of me. I know no human-like woman in Wonderland, so I wonder who this strange woman could be. I flinch and mewl like a frightend kitten as I feel cold hands pull one of the legs of my pants up to my knee and feel around the wound. My leg feels like it's on fire. I become dizzy suddenly, so I close my eyes and depend on my hearing to know what the woman is doing. I hear a few hmms and gasps as the cold, yet gentle, fingers touch my injured leg. The cold hands are helping to numb the burning sensation, but they soon go away and my leg starts to badly hurt again. I hear a long ripping noise, as though a cloth were being torn in two. The cold hand return to my leg, but this time with some silky fabric in them. I am getting sleepy. The woman wraps the thing around my wound and I can tell the bleeding is beggining to slow. I drift into the blackness of unconsiousness as I feel the motion of being dragged. The last thought that goes through my mind is 'Who is this woman...?". Then nothingness.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

I begin to stur to wakefullness. I can feel a cold wind blowing, but I can tell some thing hot is keeping me warm. I'm laying on my back, my head propped onto what is most likely a fallen branch. "Uh..." I groan as I try to shift into a more comfortable position, but the same cold hands as before press onto my chest and keep me in place. "Please don't move, or you'll open your wounds." a voice says, and I reconise it as the woman from before. Her hands are so cold. Why do they feel like ice? Am I not wearing my shirt? "Just stay still." the stranger says. Her voice is soft and beautiful like chimes in the wind, but it has a cold, dead feeling to it. It also sounds like she's been angery at things and people for years. Her voice sends shivers of pleasure and fear up my spine due to the diverse clash of traits to her velvet tone. I slowly begin to open my eyes. My vision is shakey and blured, but soon steadies. This woman is very beautiful. Her skin looks as soft as silk and as white as the full moon, her slender arms return to her sides as she stands up. My eyes fallow her steady, gracefull movements as her eligant and fragile frame seems to dance past a fire and to some thing that looks like a bowl. She has brown hair, cut very short in a messy way that seems rushed. It almost looks as short as a man's hair usually is. I notice her silvery-red dress carefully traces her irrisistible body, ending in a torn like way at her knees. She wears a coat just like Alice's, but it's totally black. It's as though she glides as she bends down to pick up the bowl, dipping a grey thing into whatever the bowl was carrying. She walks back over to me and kneels down, seeming to not notice me staring at her. She takes what I now reconise as a cloth out of what looks like water and begins to dab at cuts on my arm. I notice that my shirt is infact no longer on me, but rather keeping my hurt leg off of the ground. She moves onto whiping dried blood from cutst on my bare chest. I see her steal a glance at me before looking back at my chest as she cleared away the grime. "Could you tell me what happened?" her conflicting voice whispered out, though it still echoed through the quietness of the forest. I haven't spoken in so long, that I decide to say some thing else first. "Only if you tell me your name." my scratchy voice responds. Comepared to her lovely voice, it'd be better if I didn't speak. "Just call me Lace." she said, not taking her crimson eyes away from her work. Though her eyes looked like they had been lively once, they were glazed over and cold now. "Well, Lace, I was climbing through the trees and fell. Simple as that." I rasped, flinching as she started to directly clean an open wound. "Why?" she asked, putting the cloth back in the bowl and turning to look at me. I resisted the urge to touch her delicate hands. They were soft, almost like a new blanket. "Why were you climbing?" she asked again, her curiosity barely showing. I shrug, pretending it doesn't hurt. "I just wanted to." I say, my voice sounding a little bit better. Her brows furrow as a disappointed look spread across her face. I chuckled at the look because it looked so cute on her. "Are you hungery?" she askes reaching out of veiw simply to present to me a handfull of berries. "No, why?" I say, unsure of what kind of berry she wanted to feed me. "You've been sleeping for two days." she says quietly, almost like her question had been stupid. I look to meet her gaze, but she glances away, only showing me a profile of her face. We stay like that in silence for a long time, nothing but the sound of a dimming fire and the wind reaching our ears. "What's your name?" she suddenly asks, making me jump. Lace is still looking away, but I answer her any how. "I am the Cheshire Cat." I say, trying to sound proud of my name. "Well, Cheshire Cat, you seem familuar some how." she said as she looked back at me. "I do? How so?" is me reponce. "Your red eye and your bell, I feel like I've seen them before." she sighs, "Just never mind, I'm only rambling nonsense." "Not true!" I object. Lace stares at me in almost surprise. "Nonsense and madness are what made Wonderland such a wonderfulplace before!" I purr. My voice almost sounds normal again. It's a little dead, but it's starting to get that worn yet lively sound to it agian. "Is that where I am, Mr. Cheshire Cat?" the lovely woman who saved my life asks. "Just call me Cheshire, and yes, that is where you are. Or at least where you look like you are, but where are you really?" I ask, not even noticing I'm becoming more like my old self with every minute that passes. Lace some how makes me think of Alice, so that is why I continue to talk with her.

"I'm afriad I don't understand your question, but it does rememind me of some one..." "Then stop trying to figure ot the question and answer with what first comes to your mind." "Fine..... I'm really in the past, that work for you?" I laugh at how snarky her question sounds. I think I've finally figured her out, so I begin to almost quiz her in a way.
"How'd you get here?"
"I was sent here by a gate."
"How'd that happen?"
"I was told to come here by... special people."
"Don't you think that's a little odd?"
"Yes. But I still did it."
I don't think she even relizes what I'm doing. She's starting to answer almost to slowly for some thing that happened so recently, so I continue.
"Who do I remind you of?"
"A Chain I once met."
"How'd you meet him?"
"I was looking for some thing."
"Looking for what?"
"A memory."
"How long ago?"
"Ten years ago."
I'm posative that I'm correct now. I ask just one last question for the fun of it.
"What's your real name, Lace?"
She hesitates before answering, realizing what I'd just done. "Alice."
A smile spreads across my lips. The first time I smile after ten years, and I know it looks the same as ever. "Welcome back, Alice. Now, wasn't that anti-climatic?" I say, sitting up despite her efferts to keep me down. Alice sighs, giving up on try to push me back to the ground. Instead, Alice wraps her cold arms around me and rests her head on my chest. "Thanks... and I must agree that did come very calmly." she murmers. I want so badly to kiss her forehead, but for now I'll have maintain myself as her friend. Suddenly, life is once again worth living.