Sorry for the wait guys. To be honest, I think I tried a little too hard for this chapter. I may have overestimated my writing abilities lol. This was so HARD to write out and it took way to long to figure it out in a way that sounded good. This is also a really long chapter - so heads up. It also doesn't help that I got addicted to Kingdom Hearts cutscene "movies" during the last few months. Well...here it is. Hope you guys like it?

- Sunset

Disclaimer: I don't own Vocaloid in any way, shape of form along with the concepts/quotes of Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland

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Alice: In Court

"Order in the court! Order in the court! The trial is about to begin! Order in the court!"

Blaring his trumpet and yelling out with a melodious voice, the trumpeter stood in the front of the courtroom, demanding silence. Glancing up at the Queen, who in turn looked back with impatience, he nervously shuffled his feet before blaring his trumpet once again. Creating a sound that rattled the walls, the noise in the courtroom instantly settled.

Seated in the front row, Miku looked around anxiously. From what she could remember, she had never been in a courtroom before…probably? Looking for the Cheshire Cat, she instead met eyes with the Queen. Sitting regally in the judge's seat, the Queen momentarily stared her down, the look in her eyes unreadable to Miku. Thankfully short lived, the Queen frowned, yelling out, "Bring in the defendant!"

Paraded in from a side door, a soldier in chains was bought before the Queen. From her seat in the audience, Miku noticed that the soldier had one heart printed on the chest of his uniform, embroidered beautifully with red, gold and black thread. "State his crime."

Nodding his head once, the trumpeter unrolled the parchment scroll in his hands and cleared his throat. In the forced silence of the courtroom, he announced, "The Queen of Hearts, she made some tarts, all on a summer's day: The Knave of Hearts, he stole those tarts and took them quite away! What does the defendant have to say for himself?"

Taking a deep breath, the soldier plead, "Please Your Highness! It wasn't me! I swear it wasn't! It was – "

"Guilty!" Cutting him off, the Queen's words resounded in the courtroom, leaving no room for argument. "You are guilty of stealing my tarts! Off with your head!"

Lips parted, the soldier's next words died on his lips. Sucking in his breath, he held it for a moment before shakily letting it out. Nothing would ever change, would it? Standing straight, chains clanging with every subtle movement, the Knave of Hearts looked up at Her Royal Highness, the Queen of Hearts. "You know it wasn't me."

Cast in an awkward silence, the Queen blinked slowly, smiling almost...ruefully. Twirling her scepter, hanging precariously from delicate fingertips, her lips moved with the words "I know." Looking at the man with condescension, amusement, and perhaps…even…love, it seemed in that moment that perhaps the rumors floating around held some truth after all. Sighing softly, she gave him a look that he was all too familiar with: there would be no apologies. It was nothing personal. It was simply part of the story they found themselves starring in, time after time again. Nothing more. Nothing less. He knew that. Really.

So what was he trying to prove? He knew how the story went. Everyone in Wonderland knew how the story went, how could they not? Their roles had been decided from the moment they came into existence. And no matter who Alice belonged to, he, as the Knave of Hearts would die. Always. Because the Knave of Hearts could only be guilty, just as the Queen of Hearts could only be cruel. And Alice. Poor pitiful Alice. Just like him, she was fated to die a thousand times, simply because she couldn't avoid herself.

Nothing would ever change. He knew that. But even so… he found that he couldn't help but meddle, if just a little bit. Passing Alice, feet dragging against the linoleum, his eyes, grey and colorless, locked on hers.

"Don't eat those tarts."

Met with confused teal eyes, the Knave of Hearts continued to allow himself to be dragged towards the doors that had spelled his death a thousand times over. There was nothing more he could do. His role was done.

Passing through the doors, they slammed behind him with a sense of finality. For a moment, the hall was silent. Waiting with tense breaths, they heard it, the thick movement of air and the sound of something heavy hitting the floor. And as blood seeped out from under the doorway, the most beautiful of reds, the Queen smiled, tired and strained.

"Now bring forth the next defendant."

Bowing lowly, the trumpeter pulled out another parchment scroll. Taking a deep breath, he blared his trumpet and announced, "Alice! To the stand!"

Alice: Always Alice

Every time Alice came back to Wonderland, she (or sometimes he) was always a little bit different. It was the tiny things – how she looked, the people she had lost, the type of pain she harbored, the extent of her determination, things like that. But truth be told, everyone preferred it that way (more or less). With Alice around, things were never boring. She was their star, their eternal entertainment. With Alice around, there was a meaning to their lives, a reason to exist (a reason to die). In a world where the story never really changed, Alice was everything; hated and loved, worshiped and despised, they were nothing without her. Who Alice would belong to, the path she'd take, the way she'd react, every time was eerily different and the same, a constant contradiction. Living and dying over and over, how would the story change the next time? What would stay the same? Who would be allowed to love her next? How would she die? Not even Time could tell.

Alice: Going With The Flow

Sitting in a bustling courtroom, the girl couldn't help but question who she was, the name of her existence and all that. She knew it was better to be Miku. But what if she was actually Alice? What if she was meant to be Alice, not Miku? But if she was meant to be Alice, then that could only mean that she was meant to die. To be caught by the Hatter (whoever that was) or to be found guilty and beheaded by the Queen's soldiers. In the end, it would all be the same, wouldn't it?

But what about the doll? What about the boy named Mikuo? What if she was actually meant to be Miku? What then?

Did she want to die? Or did she want to live? Even a question as simple as that seemed hard. There were so many things jumbled in her head. A woman with pink hair or maybe it was a boy. A simple house with a garden and an oak tree and pink grass. She remembered, or at least she thought she did, of cigarette smoke and rooftops, and a smile so beautiful that it hurt. Most of all, she remembered being desperate, though of what she wasn't sure. None of it made sense. Not a single piece of it. Not the name Alice or the name Miku or the responsibilities of being either.

The only thing that did make sense were the words "Alice to the stand!" Repeating on an endless loop, the words weren't overpowering or suffocating, just…there. A reminder that despite all that she didn't understand, there were still things she could do. Stand up. Approach the stand. Leave when it gets hectic. Don't slip on blood. Don't eat the tarts. From there….well….she'd figure it out. For living in a world so hell bent on killing her, she was doing all right, staying alive.

Alice: Reimagining It All

"Your Highness! Should I read Alice's crimes?"

Drumming her fingertips against the armrest of her chair, the Queen made a show of pausing to think. Resting her eyes on Alice, she took a small pleasure in realizing how different the current Alice was from the previous ones. Slightly more stubborn, irrevocably broken but somehow still in one piece. It'd be interesting to see how much more she could take.

"No. It's a waste of time…Just bring up the witnesses."

"As you wish." Facing the crowd, the trumpeter blared his horn. Pulling out a different scroll from the folds of his robe, he called forth, "The Bats! Would you please present yourselves to the witness's box?"

Bats? And in Miku's head, something blurred. Something from days or perhaps years ago.

Flying to the front of the room, a small group of bats approached and hovered above the witness box, the sound of their wings filling the courtroom. Staring at the bats, Alice found their eyes to be oddly pretty, like little stars. They looked familiar. Sinking in, her mind drifted, imagining herself and a boy dancing. His face is blank. But in the darkness their hands are joined and together they sing, "Twinkle twinkle little bat, how I wonder where you're at! Up above the world you fly, like a tea tray in the sky!" For some reason, the words felt wrong.

It was the bat's screeches that brung her out from her daydream. She has to focus. She can't follow the flow if she loses the flow. But did anyone even understand bat? Apparently so. A soldier shouted, "Alice has no one but herself to blame! Alice was clearly desperate, leaping into the hole at her own will! Alice is greedy for a love that no longer exists!"

Miku found that she remembered this, pushing herself over the edge and into the hole. She remembered running and crashing to the ground seconds before, dirt under her nails. She remembered chasing after the doll with all of her might. She can't remember why. The place beyond Wonderland, she can't remember it either. Perhaps she was Miku there? Or was she still Alice?

"The Brown Mouse! Would you please present yourself to the witness's box?"

Another animal. Would it also need a translator to be understood? The new witness seemed familiar as well though. It looked awfully like…the grumpy mouse in the lake?

Looking directly at her, it pointed up its nose in disdain. "Alice is guilty!" Squeaking with thinly veiled frustration, the brown mouse yelled out, "Alice is guilty of being self centered!"

It was the same mouse. Alice found that she remembered that too…

"This is why I hate humans! Doing everything selfishly as they please…Just how egocentric are you guys? You should have stayed and drowned underwater! Then maybe you wouldn't be a bother to everyone else around you!"

She had made it angry. "Nearly drowning me and everyone around her in a pool of tears. Alice never thinks of anyone else!"

The words hurt. Miku wondered how true they were. "Didn't he have problems himself?"

And that's the thing…He did. But Alice doesn't know who "he" is. She just knows that he did. Just like she knows that the pain in her chest is familiar, like an insane desperation to apologize until her tongue withers up. Apologize to whom though? Her head hurts. Focus. She has to focus.

Distantly, the trumpet blared. "The Duchess! Present yourself to the witness's box!"

Approaching the stand was a woman with flowing pink hair (not a boy). Escorted by soldiers, every step she took was accentuated with the sound of chains, shackled to her wrists and ankles. Watching her make her way to the stand, Miku remembered it. There was a house in a field of pink grass along with a patch of burnt grass and a small attic room with an old easel and crusty paints. The house was in flames, burning to the ground. And she was there too, watching with steel in her eyes…the woman named Leia.

Sitting primly, she stated, "Alice is guilty for going along with the lies."

Listening to her speak, Alice imagines it. There is a house with a huge garden and a giant oak tree. There is a deck of discarded playing cards and a small pile of books. The sun is burning in the sky. And protected by the shade is a girl and a boy with a kind smile. It is a beautiful smile.

"You knew it wasn't real."

Every so often, the girl would ask, "Are you happy?" and he'd say yes. Smiling so gently, he'd say yes.

"And yet…you did nothing. Nothing at all."

Whose smile was that?

The trumpet resounds. "The maid! Present yourself to the witness's box!"

The maid – Leia's maid - was a girl with short green hair and green eyes. They could have been sisters. "Alice stole my identity."

And Miku supposed that in a way, she did. She can remember the way they always said it, so casually. "There is no need to bother with someone as useless as him. Not when we have you, my dear."

Eyes so resigned, her heart sank a little lower. "You always did steal all of the attention."

The trumpet shatters. "The Caterpillar! Would you please present yourself to the witness's box?"

Miku remembered this too. The woods, the cloud of smoke, the sunlight glinting off of his glasses. She remembered choking. She remembered running away.

"Alice stormed away when the truth didn't meet her ideals."

Alice was not so sure. She imagines something different. She could see it: A rooftop, surrounded by a dusty haze of cigarette smoke, the moonlight glinting off his eyes, impenetrable dull orbs. And there she is, screaming and choking on her words. She doesn't want to hear it.

The smoke covered them all. Polluting their senses, the Caterpillar sighed, as if bored with the entire ordeal. "You should have tried to understand."

She remembered running away.

Wait..what trumpet? "Yuki the Butterfly! Please present yourself to the witness's box!"

Her knees hit the floor. Maybe. Possibly? Her body felt too heavy. Or really light. It's hard to tell. Who was she again? Looking down at her with large brown eyes, the little girl from the woods...or the park frowned.

"Alice never listens to anyone, not really. Alice didn't listen to Yuki. "

Looking at her with deep blue eyes, he frowned, "I think there's something up with your bro. He's been acting weird lately. He seems….off."

"And she didn't listen to Luki either. Such a bad girl." (Or maybe it was a boy after all?)

"You need to talk to him! He won't listen to anyone else but you. Please?"

When did she have a brother? Vaguely, Alice can imagine it, lying in the lap of a boy who looks exactly like her but different. Taller, broader, quieter. Combing her hair with his fingers, the silence is full of words, unsaid and ignored. They seem happy, or she tells herself.

A sound? "The Mad Hatter!" What a pretty voice. "Present yourself to the witness's box!" Kaito always was the best singer out of all of them.

Lounging in the chair, as if nothing's wrong, he winks conspiratorially. His smile is like from before. Somewhat off but kind yet overbearing and suffocating. Miku finds it hard to breathe. One breath. Two. (Refusing to meet his eyes). He presents her with Earl grey and a small plate of tarts. She hated Earl Grey. The tarts weren't too bad though. He loved Earl Grey though. The brother she imagines.

"Alice is obsessed. She doesn't think about anything other than him. She only sees what she wants to see."

The smile that was so beautiful is more frightening than anything else. It's a trick of the eyes though. She's remembering it wrong. Hugging her so tightly, he tells her everything she wants to hear. She is happy. They are happy, but at the same time…she's finding it hard to breathe.

"Depending on him for your happiness, you were strangling him."

Someone was breathing way too loudly. Alternating between heaving ragged breaths and releasing broken little gasps, the sound clogged Alice's head.

But there's nothing. There's nothing at all. "The March Hare and the Doormouse! Please present yourselves to the witness's box!" It was a girl with magenta drill styled hair and light brown rabbit ears. She had a bandage on her cheek. Hands clasped tight with the sliver haired boy, mouse ears, falling asleep. Bandages wound around his head, messy like the ones on his arms.

"We sacrificed ourselves for Alice's happiness!"

Echoing, reverberating, filling every space, there was no escape from the sound. No escape at all.

"Are you happy?"

"But she didn't even notice."

"Yeah…"

Eyes dazed, unseeing, stuck in three seconds ago, she couldn't figure out where the sounds were coming from. How annoying.

"Of course I'm happy."

"The little things always seem to slip through her fingers…"

How irritating. Someone shut him up. Or her. She didn't care who. She didn't care how. Just…please? She can't think.

"Don't worry about it. I'm fine." He was fine. He was always fine. Smiling so beautifully, he was happy. There was absolutely nothing wrong.

Ah. It's her.

"Weren't you the one who was supposed to know him best?"

Who was the liar?

"And now! For the final piece of evidence! The Doll!"

Silence and noise. So much noise. "I'm so tired of this!" Slowly looking up, a soldier held the doll she had been looking for all along. "Aren't you?" Tattered and old, why was she chasing it? "They don't need us!" Why did she go down the hole? "…And we don't need them." Who was Miku? "...Are...Are you happy?" Who was Alice? "No." Who is the girl cradling the doll? "I'm not." The girl who looked so insulted upon receiving it? "I can't do this anymore." And the boy. "What about you?" Appearing and reappearing, imagined and reimagined, who was he? "Are you happy?" Who was Mikuo? "I…." Just what was she trying so hard for? "I don't know…"

Pulling the leek out of the doll's hands, the leek turned into a parchment scroll. Magic. "Let's escape." Handing it over to the trumpeter, ("Somewhere for just me and you.") he read out loud:

"These memories that we hold dear, this our secret and no one else's.

Finally...She could remember it. (Once upon a time, in a far away place, there was a girl and a boy. They were three years apart. Teal hair. Teal eyes. Such a cute pair of siblings. They were oh so very happy. And smart. Oh so very smart. But she was smarter. Abnormally smart. A genius. A prodigy, they'd claimed. Therefore he was inferior. Practically useless. Essentially unnecessary, because: "You need to try harder." The girl thought otherwise. To the girl he was happiness. "You are all I need." To the girl, he was safety. That was what he became.)

No one can take them from us.

It was so easy to imagine. (There used to be a girl and a boy. She was quiet and soft spoken. He was awkward and gangly. There was so much pressure, it was almost cruel. She was all they saw, the embodiment of their pride.. "We are so proud of you." "You have so much potential." "You will achieve so much." Sometimes she liked the attention. Most times she hated it. And yet, he continued to struggle uselessly. "Just how stupid are you?" "Did you actually think this was good enough?" He hated it. It was never enough. He was never enough. And deep down, he knew he never would be. Continuously trying to please everyone but themselves, they grasped onto each other for strength and hope.)

We'll set ourselves free. We'll be infinite.

So what was real? (There may have been a girl and a boy. She may have been small and petite. It's possible he could have been tall and broad. A lot could have changed or nothing at all. No one really knows. There is a good chance her intelligence may have "deteriorated." He could have been to blame. No one really knows nor do they care. He was useless, tainting her with his presence, a complete bother. That is a fact - apparently. But the girl loved him. He was her happiness. That is also a fact - for sure. His smiles might have been strained. Hands clasped tight, he would do anything for her. She may as well have been his reason to exist.)

This is goodbye."

And what was fake? (There was a girl and a boy. Their hair was unbelievably long, brushing her legs, hanging past his shoulders, bound by matching hair ties. They had such dull and colorless eyes. Hands intertwined, they were "happy." So very "happy." Without telling herself, she lived in a world full of lies, shrouded by the smoke from the cigarette always in his hand. She refused to see the truth. She wanted nothing to do with it. He had long forgotten what it actually was. "Are you happy?" Together they lived, battling the world, their parents, everyone that came their way. "Yeah." They were "happy." They didn't need anyone but themselves.)

Bursting into murmurs, the crowd swells with sound and noise and so much noise and he yells, "And that concludes the presentation of witnesses! Does the defendant have anything to say for herself?" However...

Does it even matter? You are guilty after all. (There was a girl and a boy. They had decided.) Absolutely guilty. (Together they would abandon the world. Screw the truth. Screw the lies. Screw everything they needed to be, everything they were supposed to be. The world didn't need them.) Right until the very end… (They didn't need anyone but themselves. Humpty dumpty sat on a wall.) You took his kindness for granted. (Body buzzing, blood rushing, they were infinite. Together they danced in the clouds, perfect little marshmallows.) How can you even live with yourself? (For once, the world was so bright and beautiful. They were so fucking happy. Dancing on the rooftop to a song only they knew, they made wishes to bats who flew higher than tea trays.) Oh, that's right. (Twinkle twinkle little bat. It was a party! A grand ball!) You can't. (With a king and a queen and thousands of cardspeople in fabulous dresses.) You ran away. (Humpty dumpty had a great fall.) You fed his insanity, his insecurities, fueled them into something uncontrollable. (Faster and faster, higher and higher, the moon smiled and together they fell, down the hole, en route to a magical place with talking cats and crazy tea parties and a thousand endings.) He would do anything for you. (A wonderful place just for them.) And you took advantage of that. (And all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put Humpty together again.) And that is (True happiness.) simply (They would never awake again.) unforgivable.

"Off with her head!"