After the Cheshire Cat vanished, it took Chizuru quite some time to decide how to proceed as there was no main road. Eventually, she chose to take the odd man's advice and headed towards the right.

Her direction took her to one side of the forest. She was hesitant, at first, to wonder through unknown woods, but as she picked through the trees she found a small, but warn trail. I might as well follow this, she thought. This way is as good as any and it's better to follow a trail then wonder aimlessly.

The trail snaked around quite a bit and Chizuru often wondered if she was walking in circles. Time seemed to be moving slowly. Every time Chizuru looked towards the sun it seemed to have hardly moved, yet she felt like she had been walking for hours. She challenged herself to not look at the sun until she walked what she guessed to be about four miles hoping to pass the time a bit quicker. But when she looked at the sun again it seemed to have moved in a different direction. Odd, she thought. She walked another mile and looking up at the sun it seemed to have moved in yet another direction. She tried this a third time and the sun changed direction once more. "I'm beginning to think the sun moves in a square. It's a wonder anyone can tell direction here."

"Or perhaps it is you who is walking in a square," said a voice that sounded both close and far at the same time.

Chizuru looked around to find who the voice belonged to and saw a crouched figure a little ways off to the left of her hidden heavily with a grassy umbrella.

"I was trying to account for that," she said, walking towards the figure.

"It's not as easy as it looks. The sun tends to do as it pleases. I find it rather futile to speculate on the mind of the sun." While the man was clearly speaking to her, he seemed almost detached from the conversation.

When she approached the figure she found, to her surprise, what appeared to be Amagiri lounging beneath the grass umbrella. He seemed to be playing shogi, which he must have found more interesting than her as he never looked up from the board.

Chizuru was not accustomed to running into Amagiri, or other demons from his clan without being kidnapped and thus her first instinct was to run. After further consideration she remembered that nothing here was quite right and even if she did run, he could probably catch her anyway.

On closer inspection she figured the man was probably not Amagiri. In his left hand was a long red pipe. He was dressed in a bright yellow kimono and a green haori. There were blue circles on each of the sleeves of this haori quite similar to the outfit she was used to seeing him in. While this was a rather odd outfit for one to chose to wear, what truly separated him from the demon who followed Kazama was two antennae sprouting from his forehead.

"My name is Chizuru," she said, introducing herself.

"I never asked you for your name," the man replied, moving a piece on the board. While Chizuru was much closer to the man then she was before she noted that his voice still retained the quality of being both near and far at the same time. "Though I suppose it doesn't hurt to know."

"May I ask who you are?"

"You may."

When it became evident the man was not going to say anything else she asked, "What is your name?"

"Caterpillar." He took a puff from his pipe, but when he released his breath, he blew out no smoke.

Chizuru looked at the Shogi board. She had always thought the game was usually played with two people. "Who are you playing against?"

"Myself."

"Doesn't that make it rather easy to win?"

"Not in the least. I cannot think of a more challenging opponent then myself."

"But won't you always know what you are going to play next."

"Not if I do not tell myself what I am about to play. That would be cheating."

Chizuru was very confused. She decided it may be best to discontinue the small talk and go straight to business. "I am trying to find the Shinsengumi," she paused, waiting to see if he would respond. "Do you know where I can find them?"

"I do not."

"Do you know someone who can help me?"

"It is impossible."

"Impossible? Why?"

"Because you have not stated what it is you need help with. It is absurd to ask if I know someone who can help if I do not know in what way it is you are requiring help."

"But I…" Chizuru was beginning to get quite frustrated. It seemed that this Caterpillar was not an easy person to talk to. "Then, do you know someone who can help me find the Shinsengumi, or at least point me in the right direction."

Caterpillar moved another piece on the board. "I do not. I do not know the location and I cannot begin to speculate what is on the minds of others. Truly, it is rather illogical to ask me questions about other persons' minds when they are not my own."

This is getting nowhere, Chizuru thought. "May I ask you another question?"

"Yes."

"Why do you speak like that?"

"Like what?"

"Literally. Or is it specifically?"

"Properly."

"Ok, why do you speak so properly?"

"Because it is the proper thing to do. Would you have me speak improperly?"

"Well, no." She paused, considering how to ask her next question. She decided that much more of any conversation with this man would be entirely useless. "Can you at least direct me to a main road? I'm not sure that I will be able to find my way using the path that I was taking."

"I can."

"Will you?"

Without looking at her he stated, "Follow me."

Chizuru waited for him to stand, but after several minutes she realized that he probably was not going to move after all. "Um, Caterpillar. You said to follow you…"

"No, I said 'follow me.'"

"I know, but… you're not moving?"

"Why would I need to move?"

"But-"

Using his pipe, Not-Amagiri pointed towards the ground. "Follow me."

Chizuru looked down. By her feet and trailing off into the distance were the words "Follow" and "Me" stamped into the ground like a series of footprints.

I don't think those words were there before, Chizuru thought. Yet at this point, she was hardly surprised. She bowed to Not-Amagiri, "Thank you."

Without bothering to acknowledge her courtesy, Caterpillar continued his game.

Chizuru followed to word trail for quite some time. It was hard going, as she was not following any particular beaten path, but the words trail remained quite visible even on the toughest of terrain. She found it odd that she became neither tired, hungry, nor thirsty. Perhaps people here do not to eat or drink so often?" she wondered. She thought it was equally possible that she had not become tired because the sun had not yet decided set. A ridiculous notion, she would have thought had she been in her own world. But by now she was becoming quite accustomed to absurdities and strangeness. Someone could tell her that the sky is usually red, but sometimes green and she'd probably believe them. How long would she go before she ceased to use logic at all?

As Chizuru considered this, she realized the word trail was beginning to grow faint. Startled by the change she began moving more rapidly as though in doing so she could will the words into being. Yet the further she walked, the lighter the words became. By the time the words were gone completely, she reached another path. She breathed deeply, quite happy that she found the road before the word trail had faded completely. It occurred to her then that perhaps the trail had faded because she was approaching this road.

The road looked to be nothing more than a wide dirt path, but it was clearly more traveled then anything she had come across until now. When she walked on it she found that there seemed to be a bounce to her step. It was a bit difficult to get used to, but she soon found herself walking a bit quicker and more enjoyably. Her humor was short lived, however, for she soon heard a loud pop after which the ground seemed to almost deflate beneath her leaving her with the hard ground she had expected to find.

The dirt path took Chizuru in a much straighter line then the first trail she took. It was not long until she found the trees waning into blue-green grassy hills. As she past the last of the trees she saw what appeared to be smoke billowing up behind a hill. She suspected it must be coming from a camp fire from the size of it, but it had an odd syrupy quality to it that normal smoke certainly shouldn't have.

Chizuru decided to walk towards the smoke, hoping that it truly was from a camp fire. Perhaps whomever the fire belonged to would be able to direct her to the Shinsengumi?

As she neared the source of the fire she began to her what sounded like voices. Perhaps two voices. By the time she neared the top of the hill, she was fairly certain there were not only two voices, but two voices that sounded remarkably familiar. When she reached the top of the hill she saw two very familiar men not far from where she stood. Only yards before her were Harada and Nagakura dancing arm-in-arm around a camp fire singing a bawdy song about tea houses and courtesans. They appeared to be sharing one outfit between the two of them. Nagakura wore only a blue top that just barely reached his knees and opened wide at the chest while Harada wore nothing but a pair of low set white hakama, though his stomach was covered by binding. As they danced in circles they passed between them a large jug. From them smell blowing in her direction, it was probably alcohol.

"Um, excuse me," Chizuru said as she reached the camp fire.

The two men stopped mid step and mid lyric. "Ah, what do we have here?" asked the man who looked like Harada.

"It looks kind of like a bird," said Nagakura.

Harada shook his head, "More like a pretty little flower."

"A flower? That isn't very manly."

"Neither is a bird."

"It's manlier than a flower."

"But it resembles Alice a bit, don't you think?"

"More like the Knave of Hearts."

"The Knave of Hearts? Well, I suppose the Knave is more manly then a bird. Though I hardly know how she would feel at being called manly," Harada stated, pointing at Chizuru.

"Then we'll just have to ask him."

Both men turned to look at Chizuru. "Well, are you a flower or a bird," Harada asked.

"Or the Knave or Alice?" questioned Nagakura.

Chizuru hesitated. "Um… I'm Chizuru."

"Chizuru? I've never heard of a Chizuru before," Harada puzzled.

"I'm a woman."

Nagakura looked shocked. "Then it's not a bird?"

"Yes, I suppose it's a bit tall to be a flower," Harada mused.

"And it's not dressed right to be the Knave," Nagakura stated.

"Or Alice," Harada agreed.

Chizuru was baffled. What an odd thing, to be surprised that she was neither a bird nor a flower. Shouldn't it have been clear that she was a human? And who was this Knave of Hearts and Alice. "Is it really that strange?" she asked. "Are you not human too?"

Harada and Nagakura looked at each other. "I've never wondered," Nagakura frowned.

Harada shrugged. "We are who we are."

"And who would that be?"

Nagakura pointed at himself, "I'm Tweedle Dee."

"And I'm Tweedle Dum." Harada stated. "We're twins."

Nagakura put his arm over Harada's shoulders. "Identical twins, can't you tell?"

"Well, I suppose you do look a little alike," Chizuru said politely.

The two men looked at each other. "Nah," Nagakura grinned. "We don't look anything alike."

"I thought you said you were identical?" Chizuru questioned.

Harada dislodged himself from Nagakura. "We don't even have the same parents, but we do have twin spirits."

"Twin spirits?"

"That's right," Nagakura chimed in. "Our spirits are identical, except when they're not."

"But that's hardly why you're here, no?" Harada asked.

"I'm looking for the Shinsengumi," she stammered, yet as soon as the words left her mouth Nagakura became quite agitated.

"Shh!" Nagakura hissed, crouching in front of Chizuru with his index finger over his lips. "Never mention the Shinsengumi!"

"The what?" Harada asked, bending down near Nagakura. "Did you say Shinsengumi?"

"No, no she didn't."

"Why would you want to find them?" Harada asked, crestfallen.

"But… I…" Chizuru mumbled.

Nagakura sighed. "Now you got him started." He walked back over to the camp fire and sat down. "You might as well get comfortable too, this could take awhile."

Chizuru nodded and sat near Nagakura. She felt quite bewildered at the level of energy possessed by these two men. She could hardly get a word in let alone a thought.

Harada unwound the binding covering his stomach revealing a deep horizontal scar. "Tweedle Dee and I were a part of the Shinsengumi," he began. "Though that was quite some time ago. The King of Hearts and Tweedle Dee did not quite see eye-to-eye and that was a rather awkward position for me as I had no quarrel with the King. But Tweedle Dee is my twin so I had little choice but to take his side. Now, this would have been all well and fine if the Queen was taken to let those who wished to leave go, but one does not simply leave the Shinsengumi under the Queen's watch. The only obvious choice was to make the Queen mad, that way the Queen would be forced to make us commit seppuku or drink the Hatter's tea. So I stole the Queen's tart, causing quite a bit of anger. I chose seppuku over the Hatter's tea, as I am not very fond of tea. Though, the cut I made was far too shallow and to the dismay of the Queen I was still very much alive. But the Duchess felt rather sorry for me, and convinced the Queen to let the both of us go. The Duchess has rather a way with words and it probably helped that the Queen had become quite taken with the Duchess's servant. But that is another tale for another time." Finishing his story, Harada breathed deeply as though this was the first breath he took since her started his story. Chizuru suspected it might have been.

Chizuru was quite confused by Not-Harada's story. With the way Not-Nagakura ranted she had assumed it would take him a good deal longer to tell his tale. It was also a very un-Harada like story to tell. That aside, she rather wondered what a tart was and what was so bad about Hatter's tea. And this Duchess character. She must be quite a woman to sway the Queen. But as Harada re-wrapped his stomach, she figured she really should say something. "That was quite the tale, though it really wasn't all that long," she noted.

"It varies in length depending on his mood and how drunk he is," Nagakura whispered.

"I rather like his stories," whispered another voice in her other ear.

Recognizing the voice she turned to see if the voice's owner was truly there, though she was not surprised when she saw no one. "Oki- er, Cheshire Cat, is that you?"

"Indeed, can you not see me?"

"Of course we can't," snapped Nagakura.

"Cheshire Cat, it's not very polite to speak when you are invisible," Harada chided.

"I apologize. I don't make a habit of looking at myself, so I hardly realize that others cannot see me," Okita relented, though Chizuru could practically hear his smile.

"Well then, are you going to show yourself," Harada asked, though he received no response. "Cheshire Cat, it is also rude to not answer a question when someone asks one of you."

"So sorry," Okita's voice replied. "But you did say that it was impolite to speak if I was not visible and I do not really feel like showing myself at the moment. It's far too much work."

"Well, I suppose it would be even ruder to pretend you're not here now that we know you are here, even if we can't see you," decided Nagakura.

"I am so glad that you have decided to acknowledge my existence," Okita said, rather dryly. Somehow, Chizuru didn't think he really cared. "As far as existences go, I'm rather fond of mind."

"Oh, it's quite good to be fond of one's existence," Nagakura agreed. "I know I am rather fond of my own."

Harada nodded. "I suppose that means I must be fond of my own."

"You think so?" asked Okita.

"Well yes. As Tweedle Dee and I share an existence, if one is fond of our existence, it follows that the other will as well."

Chizuru found it difficult to follow their chain of logic. It seemed to be utter nonsense, in her opinion.

Okita tilted his head to the side. "But what if you were not fond of your existence? Would it then follow that he also not be fond? By your logic you cannot hold a different opinion then Tweedle Dee and surely you must have disagreed on something."

"Perhaps," Harada acknowledged. "We disagree rather often. But it may matter more who was either fond or not fond first. Or perhaps it only matters sometimes. You see, we are not always identical."

"I'm not sure I quite follow," Nagakura stated, mirroring Chizuru's confusion. "Besides, does it really matter who is fond of who?"

"Not really," Okita's voice gleaned. Though in Chizuru's opinion, he almost sounded like he was purring. "What do you think Miss Very Confused."

"Me?" asked Chizuru.

"Why yes, I hardly know anyone as confused as you."

"Well, I… I don't really know. This is all so confusing."

"Yes, I rather thought you might say something like that. I think you may be trying to hard again. You may be overworking that little brain of yours. You may want to try sleeping on it, though I'd be careful. Some thoughts make a rather sharp bed."

"But I really need to find the Shin- er, I need to find those people I said I needed to find before."

"You could try talking to Hatter," Nagakura suggested. "He seems to know a little bit about everything there is to know."

"And some things about everything there isn't to know," Harada added.

"He also knows a bit about nothing, but don't let that stop you," Okita's voice smiled.

"Do you know where I can find this Hatter?"

"You should be able to find him if you continue on this road," Harada suggested. "This road has a tendency to lead you to your destination."

"Yup," Nagakura agreed, "except when it doesn't."

Chizuru was not that surprised with this answer. By now she had heard stranger things. "Do you know how long it will take me to reach Hatter?"

"Oh, somewhere between now and then, though I'd imagine a might closer to then," Okita entertained.

Chizuru felt that she had probably gotten as much information from the three of them as she was going to get. "Thank you for your hospitality!" Chizuru bowed. The three smiled back and continued their conversations as though she had never been there at all.

As Chizuru made her way down the hill, her thoughts grew dark. She began to realize how acutely alone she felt. There were faces she recognized, but they hardly recognized her. It was a very painful feeling. Being with the three of them reminded her of everything she was missing, even before everything went haywire. She was in a strange place where she understood so little of the world around her. She felt very much like an outsider. It was a feeling she had become quite accustomed too, but had begun to forget about as her days with the Shinsengumi became routine. She wondered if she would ever feel like she belonged or if that was something lost to her the day she discovered she was a demon. It was a deep sadness that she hadn't before allowed herself to fully acknowledge. Chizuru sank to the ground and cried.