Ding… Ding… Ding…
The sound that was similar to that of a grandfather clock strained his ears. His consciousness was slowly getting to him. He opened his eyes and saw that he was floating.
Ding… Ding… Ding…
In front of him was a large bricked Clock Tower. It showed that it was already twelve… noon or midnight? He had no idea. He was in a black space with only him and the tower visible. Everything else was black. He couldn't even see the bottom of the clock tower. The bottom half was dipped in pitch-black stretching over an endless abyss.
Ding… Ding… Ding…
Then, emerging from the clock itself was a girl. Her fringe were covering her eyes. She was hugging a rabbit plushy with red goggles on its head. The girl slowly began floating towards him. Len backed away slowly, feeling intimidated by this weird girl floating with him.
Ding… Ding… Ding…
The girl smiled. She floated closer to him and stretched out an arm and cupped one side of his face with her right hand. Len gulped. "Who are you?"
She opened her mouth, and with her surprisingly angelic voice, she spoke, "I've finally found you…"
Then, the rabbit plushy suddenly moved, freaking him even more. The rabbit grinned creepily; its eyes looking at him with mockery.
"… Alice…" the girl holding the rabbit continued.
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WONDERLAND
By: rennomiya
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Book 1: Ace of Spades
Chapter 2: Alice
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Len eyes quickly shot open, revealing his alarmed blue eyes. He raised his hand up to his chest, feeling the rapid beating of his heart. He was sweating all over. What was that nightmare about? What the hell was that, seriously? Who the hell was that girl? And what was up with the creepy rabbit doll?
His mind processed every single detail of his nightmare first before finally registering that he was not anywhere he was familiar with. He looked around his surroundings. He was inside a long narrow hallway with silky-white marble walls and black and white checkered tiled floors. He sat up, placing his hand that was previously on his chest to his aching head—which he just felt right now.
"Where am I?" Len asked himself, his voice echoing throughout the seemingly endless hallway. He looked up to the arched ceiling with gothic-designed pillars supporting it. He began remembering everything he had done prior to waking up in that weird place. He was sucked inside that website called Wonderland.
"You're in Wonderland," an unfamiliar voice said. Len turned his head back to see whose voice it belonged. He gaped when he saw a rabbit doll lying on the ground. His face turned curious. Where did that rabbit come from? He stood up and walked towards the rabbit. He outstretched his arm and grabbed the doll, inspecting it.
"Where did this thing come from…?" Len asked as he stared at the rabbit once more. Then, he realized that there was a pair of red goggles on top of the rabbit's head, just in the middle of its long ears. He suddenly threw the rabbit away in fright when he realized that it looked like the rabbit doll in his dreams.
The doll landed on the floor, bouncing a bit before staying still again.
"The hell—!" Len choked, fear evident in his voice. He kept staring at the unmoving doll, nervously anticipating something to happen. The doll was pretty creepy in his nightmare. And after what seemed like an eternity to him, the doll began moving. Its hand slowly reached inside its clothes' pocket after it stood up. A golden pocket watch was revealed from inside the doll's pocket.
"Oh gosh, I'm late!" the rabbit suddenly declared after looking at the watch. It jumped around in panic and began hopping away from him, turning into a corner.
Len remained staring at nothingness. He was too busy trying to let everything sink in. First, he woke up at an unknown place, then he saw a talking rabbit doll who was late for something.
"Wait a minute… this sequencing… the white rabbit… this weird place… Am I in Wonderland?" Len whispered to himself. According to Lewis Caroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Alice followed the rabbit into a rabbit hole and fell into Wonderland.
"If I follow that rabbit, will I be able to get into Wonderland?" Len asked himself as he began running towards where the rabbit went off to. He ran around the corner and saw a glimpse of the same rabbit turning around another corner.
"W-WAIT!" Len yelled to the rabbit. He hasted his pace to catch up to the rabbit. But the same thing happened. When he turned around the corner, he would see the rabbit turning around another corner. "I said wait!" Len yelled once more. He fastened his pace once more as he turned around another corner.
But then he stopped when he saw that the rabbit was nowhere to be found. "Crap, I lost him!" He gritted his teeth and tightened his fist. Then, he saw the rabbit hopping on another hallway through a golden-framed mirror (window) hanging on the wall beside him. "T-There it is!" Len yelled and tried to get to the same hallway where he saw the rabbit.
Then, when he thought that he was in the hallway where the rabbit went to, he only saw a room full of stairs coming from different directions; ceiling, walls, floors, another stair, doors—just literally coming from anywhere.
Then, he saw the hopping rabbit getting down on an upside-down stair that emerged from the ceiling. The stair had a red carpet on the middle, where the rabbit was hopping on to.
"There you are! Wait! I need to talk to you!" Len yelled towards the rabbit, who only ignored him and continued on getting towards where he was supposed to go to.
"Damn it! I said WAIT!" Len yelled once more and stepped on the same staircase where the rabbit was. He gasped in shock when his world suddenly turned upside down. So now, the once upside down was now downside up and the once downside up was now upside down.
"What a twisted world…" Len muttered and continued running after the rabbit.
The staircase led him towards a normal-sized door within a gigantic wooden door carved with different aesthetic designs. There was also an opened small door within the normal-size door, and so he assumed that the white rabbit just entered there. He entered through the normal-sized door and inside it was a dark room with a huge window with golden carved railings and red curtains.
He took a moment to observe the place first before seeing in his peripheral vision a bouncing rabbit coming from behind him. "What the—! You were hopping ahead of me! How did you get behind me?" he asked the rabbit who only just ignored him and continued on hopping away.
"Gumi… there you are," a voice said behind the darkness of the room.
He squinted to see who it was. He slightly saw the rabbit hopping towards that person and stopped in front of her. The girl slightly bends to the ground to get the rabbit.
The girl seemed to have noticed him and so she remained motionless after she carried the rabbit in her arms. "... And who might you be?" the girl asked him in monotone.
"Uh… L-Len. Kagamine Len…" he answered reluctantly.
"I see. And you followed Gumi here…" she assumed. She walked closer to him. The light coming from outside the window illuminated her as she stepped in parallel to the huge window.
Len's cheek reddened once he saw her face clearly. Yes, it was a bit dark, with only the window as the source of light, but it was clear enough to see the girl's features.
She had a white ribbon on top of her short blonde hair. Some clips were keeping some of her bangs from her face. Her eyes were the color of blue—the same shade as his'. She was also wearing a black Victorian-era style dress.
Len only realized that she was close enough to him when she ran her middle and ring finger on his cheek. "You must be Alice," she said.
"Uh…" he voiced out dumbly. No words were entering his mind to answer the girl. He was too stunned. That girl looks almost exactly like him, if not for some girly features.
The girl suddenly smiled, making Len's red face redden even more. Len found himself unable to move—he can't even take his eyes away from the girl. He mentally cursed himself. He wasn't used to talking to girls and suddenly having such a pretty girl talking to him and looking at him directly was enough to make his brain malfunction.
"It's nice to finally meet you," she said, still smiling.
His heart fluttered a bit. Len was starting to wonder if he turned into stone, because he may as well be one. The more she looked at him, the more his mentality suffered. Did she have to be this attractive? He was feeling eerily hot and could feel sweat forming on places he would rather not talk about.
"Whoops, slow down there, you."
Len and the girl turned their heads around to see a silver-haired man sitting on the windowsill, lighting his stick of cigarette.
"I'd appreciate it if you do not get closer to my Lady," he said.
'My L-Lady?!' screamed Len to himself as he began to panic.
"Dell…" the girl silently muttered. So the girl knew that cool-looking mysterious guy.
Dell jumped a bit from where he was sitting on and slowly walked towards the two of them. Then, he blew a huff of smoke into Len's face. The blond boy coughed and covered his nose. He fanned away some smoke using his hand and glared at Dell. "You bastard! What was that for?"
Dell simply ignored him and turned to the girl. "Rin, what are you doing in this floor? I've been looking everywhere for you. I thought something bad happened to you."
The girl, Rin, closed her eyes and hugged her bunny plushy tighter. "That's pretty unlikely, don't you think so Gumi?"
"Gumi is here to protect Rin!" the bunny plushy declared.
'Rin… that name sounds familiar…' Len thought. "Wait a second here… just who the heck are you guys?" he asked.
He got Dell, Rin and Gumi's attention. They looked at him with bored eyes and then the rabbit plushy, Gumi, suddenly chuckled. "An idiot Alice; that's what we have here!"
"Huh?" Len was still confused. "What are you talking about?"
"Don't be too hard on him, Gumi," Rin said. "And you, too, Dell," she added when she saw Dell approaching Len and was about to puff smoke on him to purposely annoy him, again.
"Tch. Alright, alright," Dell answered and went back to Rin's side.
"Just answer me already!" Len said impatiently.
"I'm Kagamine Rin. This is Honne Dell and this rabbit is Megpoid Gumi," Rin introduced. "And you," she pointed towards Len, "are Alice, the wanderer."
Len's brow twitched. "Need I remind you that my name is Kagamine Len—wait… what? Kagamine Rin? As in Kagamine Rin?" Inwardly, he was glad he was able to finally talk to the girl normally, and the weird fluttering feeling he got on his chest was slowly dying down.
The three seemed a bit surprise by Len's familiarity towards Rin's name. "You know Rin?" Dell asked and looked at Rin curiously.
Len's thoughtful look disappeared and was replaced with a beaming face. "You're Kagamine Rin-chan!" he said happily and took her hands. He remembered all the pictures of Rin Mikuo showed him once upon a time and was relieved to recall the same person. "I can't believe it, you're here! The truth is, Mikuo also got stuck here… he's the reason why I'm here myself. But… wait a minute… What are you doing in this place?"
Rin looked at him questioningly. "I am here simply because I exist here," she replied monotonously. "And I don't understand what makes you say that you know me prior to meeting me today."
"Huh?" Len dumbly voiced out. What is Rin talking about?
"Rin, he thinks that you're Alice, too," Dell whispered to Rin but was still heard by Len.
Alice? What was up with that name? "Hey Rin, I, uh, uhm… you see, we haven't really personally met before but I know you because of Mikuo. He's constantly talking about you! I mean… since you're here, that means you also accessed that Wonderland website, right?"
Rin's face remained confused. "I don't know who that Mikuo is," she confessed rather bluntly. "And what is this Wonderland website you're talking about?"
Gumi chuckled again. "From an idiotic Alice to a crazy Alice! What more can you ask for?" Gumi commented happily.
Len glared at the bunny plushy before turning to Rin again. "Why are you acting like you don't know what I'm talking about? You probably accessed Wonderland's website too that's why you're here! What's the use of pretending? Listen, Mikuo is also stuck here like us! We need to find him so that we could get out of here together!"
Dell glowered at Len and violently shoved him out of the way. Len was thrown a few feet away from them. Dell held Rin closer to him. "Stop putting lies inside my Lady's head. You're being too annoying." Dell looked at Rin and Gumi and said, "Let's just go before he turns anymore crazy."
"That's likely going to happen, hihi~" Gumi said while Rin nodded and followed Dell.
"Wait a minute!" Len yelled and got up as he rubbed his aching head, thanks to Dell's push. "I still don't get it why you're acting like you're not from the other world, too, Rin… but—at least… at least show some concern for Mikuo! You guys have been friends for years now, haven't you?"
"When will you stop that? For the last time, Rin isn't from the other world like you!" Dell yelled angrily as he crushed the cigarette stick on his hand.
"So you're telling me that the others aren't from the other world, too? Haha, stop kidding me! This is a serious matter!" Len yelled back and stomped closer to Dell.
"What?" Dell asked unbelievably. "There are no other Alices here but you! You're the only Alice that came here!" he yelled.
"There you go with that girly name again! My name is Len, not Alice! When will you remember that?"
"… 'Alice' is what we call people here who came from the other world. Since you came from the other world, you're called 'Alice'," Rin suddenly interrupted with a calm voice.
Dell and Len stopped fighting and looked at Rin. Dell nodded in agreement with his Lady and cleared his throat while Len's eyes went wide at the news he heard. If Alice is what they call people here who came from another world… and, as per what Dell said, he was the only Alice there.
"Then what happened to Mikuo?" he asked with a shaky voice. "D-Does that mean that Mikuo isn't here? A-And the other people that got stuck here… including that uh… what was her name again? The girl on the news last night? Oh yeah, Megurine Luka? Where are they? A-And why do you bear the same name and face as the Kagamine Rin that I know?"
"We can't answer all those questions, stupid," Dell said as he lit another stick of cigarette.
"… But, there may be another person who could answer you," Rin said and looked at Gumi, "Right, Gumi?"
"Right!" Gumi said happily and continued, "The Four Great Leaders of Wonderland, The Trump Cards!"
"Trump cards? Who…?" Len's voice faded.
Rin replied with her monotonous voice, "They are the creators of this world. Ace of Spades, Jack of Clubs, King of Diamonds, and the Queen of Hearts. But the most fearsome leader of them all is the Queen of Hearts. She's the one who decides about anything. The other three protects her and serve as her guardians. There's also a rumor about another guardian called The Joker. Although no one knows who or where he is."
"So anyway, you're telling me that those four knows where Mikuo and the others are?" Len asked expectantly.
"Correct!" Gumi said cheerfully.
"Then, where can I find them?" the blonde boy asked enthusiastically, feeling a bit hopeful.
"In the castle," Rin responded, "where everything all began."
"Where is that?" Len asked once more.
Rin pointed her index finger upward. Len followed where it pointed and only saw the ceiling on top of them. "The… ceiling?" he said unsurely.
"Idiot!" Gumi said with a squeaky laugh.
"Would you stop calling me an idiot!" Len yelled at the White Rabbit.
"She's pointing to the top floor," Dell said. "This place where we are right now? It's called the Caucus Floor. The 5th floor of Wonderland."
"Okay, I'm lost. 5th floor?" Len asked with a confused face.
"Wonderland is the world of confusing and twisted floors. It's basically a really tall tower with 999 floors. And there is a World of Another per floor," Dell said.
"What is a World of Another?"
"Every floor has a Guardian. Every floor looks different and its look is based on the Guardian's Heart. The World of Another is what we call that Guardian's Heart."
"I still don't get it~" Len said with a depressed face.
"That's because you're an idiot~" Gumi said. Len glared at her.
Dell sighed and tried to explain it to him again. "Let me give you an example. Let's just pretend that this floor's Guardian is Rin. And so, this floor's look will be based on what Rin's heart looks like. Do you get it now?"
Len looked around. The place they were standing right now looked like a rundown vintage living room. Then that meant that this is what this floor's Guardian's heart looks like. "So in short… the World of Another is basically the Guardian's Heart… right?"
"Correct."
"Then who is this floor's Guardian?" Len asked, examining the three of them.
Dell and Rin looked at Gumi.
Len's mouth dropped. "Gumi's the 5th floor's Guardian?!" he yelled with disbelief.
"How insulting!" Gumi said with a pout. Then, she suddenly glowed. Rin gently dropped her on the ground and Len gawked as Gumi materialized into a human being. She had short green hair with a pair of goggles on top of it and the same shade of green for her eyes. She was almost the same height as Rin, with her being taller than the latter by a few millimeters. She was still wearing the same outfit she had as a bunny.
Len gaped at Gumi's human form. "Uh… wow. You just… suddenly… transformed. Like a… uh… a magical girl."
"I'll take that as a compliment, Alice," Gumi said and turned back.
"I should tell you that you shouldn't provoke a floor's Guardian, if you want to go higher in Wonderland," Dell warned him.
"Why?"
Rin pointed towards her right. Len followed it and saw an elevator with intricate designs. "That elevator is your way up. To make it move, you need a Guardian's key. And to get a Guardian's key, you must negotiate with him… or her," Rin said, looking at Gumi.
"Ever heard of the Caucus Race~?" Gumi suddenly asked, turning back around to face him.
"Uh… n-no?"
"A Caucus Race is a kind of racing which consists of everyone running in a circle with no clear winner. That means, in order to get to another floor, you have to fulfill that race and become the winner!"
Len's brow twitched. "You want me to run around in circles like an idiot?" he yelled at Gumi comically.
"Aren't you already one?" Gumi scoffed as she looked at Len mockingly.
A vein appeared on Len's forehead. "Why you little—"
"And BEGIN~" Gumi said.
Len said, "I won't go around running in—huh, what the—hey!" Len's legs involuntarily ran off across the room. "What the heck is—whoa—going on here? Why am I running around in circles?!" he yelled as the other three watched him run around in circles. Involuntarily.
"INCREASE SPEED~" Gumi said and Len's pace became faster. He's gradually getting dizzy.
"You sadistic rabbit! You're making me run, aren't you? How are you even doing it? I—huff, huff—I'm going to get you for this you little—"
"Stop complaining," Dell said with an evil smirk. "You want to get to the top floor right? Then you have to comply to Gumi's wishes."
"When I can control my movements again, I swear I'm going to kill you two!" Len said with angry flames lighting up behind him.
Rin stared at the flames behind him. "He's angry," she said.
"Just stop this will you!" Len yelled as his pace became even faster. He was so fast the only thing they could see was the flash of the color of his clothes.
Rin looked at where Len was running. "He's fast," she said.
"Rin! Aren't you going to say something to those two?" Len begged in a muffled voice, and almost teary eyes.
Rin remained staring at him. She looked towards Gumi and Dell who were both grinning evilly at the suffering Len. "Gumi-chan, Dell… stop."
And Len's running was halted. He dropped on the ground, panting like crazy. He was also drenched in sweat. "Thank—huff—you," he said to Rin.
Gumi jumped and hugged Rin. "Why did you make him stop, Rinny?" Gumi said with a pout. "It was getting exciting too."
Rin looked at Gumi with innocent eyes. "Because he told me to make you stop."
"That's all? Sigh~" Gumi said and continued pouting.
"You don't have to obey his orders, milady," Dell said as he approached Rin.
"Eh? I don't?" Rin asked in confusion.
After Len finally recovered his strength from all that unnecessary running, Gumi gave him the keys to the elevator.
"Well, I guess I'll see you guys around. Thanks for the basic information about Wonderland. I'm off to the top floor…" Len bid farewell as he inserted the key to the keyhole. A small compartment opened at the side and it revealed two buttons. One to go up and one to go down.
"… I hope you find your friend," Rin said as she stepped forward.
Len blushed slightly as he pressed the 'up' button and grinned at her. "Sure! I think I'll be able to find him though! Oh, wait a minute!" Len looked at Gumi, "Didn't you say earlier when I first saw you that you're late for something important?"
Gumi tilted her head sideways, as if remembering something. Then she said with a smile, "I've already arrived."
Len looked at her confusedly. Then, the elevator dinged and its two doors opened. "I guess I'm off. See you guys," he said as he stepped inside.
"Don't get into too much trouble with the other Guardians," Dell reminded him as he puffed a smoke.
Len grinned. "Sure!"
Just before the elevator closes, Len saw that Dell smirked evilly at him. "See you at the 392nd floor."
"H-Huh?"
Then, in a flash, Rin snatched away Gumi's golden pocket watch and jumped inside the elevator, just a second before it closes.
When the door completely closed, he could hear Dell and Gumi's gasps as he stared at Rin with confusion.
Rin's stood up properly and looked at Len. "I'm coming with you."
To be continued.
A/N: Whooo! Done at last! And it took me months to update! Sorry 'bout that~ haha. Did you guys get the whole Wonderland concept? If not, don't be afraid to pm me or ask it in your reviews and I'll gladly explain it :)
By the way, what do you guys think happened to Mikuo? I wonder where he is? Who're the Trump Cards? And why did Rin take away Gumi's watch? All will be answered in the future chapters :D
I apologize for the grammatical errors and spelling mistakes. Please feel free to point them out so that I would improve ;D
Also, don't forget to review :)
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