Author's note: It's been FOREVER since I updated this. I actually wrote this back in August but I had exams then. And then there was my projectwork. Ah, anyway, here it is. Hope this makes sense. Please review! I want to know what you guys think of it :)

Disclaimer: I do not own Kuroko no Basuke.

Chapter 6

Alice jogged along, pushing aside flowers and asking for help every once in a while. Most of them were unwilling to speak to her, and the moment she mentioned the Void, many of them drew themselves back up and refused to speak. Nonetheless, she managed to find a few that pushed her in the right direction, again with the warning not to lose herself.

Perhaps this Void takes away your memories? How else would one lose themselves? Alice wondered. Yet no matter how she thought about it, she couldn't seem to come to an answer; the concepts kept slipping from her grasp.

Soon, the tall stalks of flowers began to thin out around her, and the grass under her boots turned dry and crunchy. In a few more paces, her feet pounded against hard earth, the land around her barren.

She came to an abrupt halt, breathing deeply to catch her breath. The air smelled strongly of brine and rot, a particular scent she had always associated with large salt bodies. It was not wholly unpleasant, but it did seem to be getting more potent with each lungful she took in.

She grew light-headed, her vision blurring as she gazed out at the open water. The surface of the sea was still, broken only by a few ripples. Yet she was certain she had heard a sound like rushing water before, so where had it come from?

Alice fought against her heavy lids as she scanned the sea from end to end, but could make out nothing. The area surrounding the water body was completely dark, as if it was sucking the light and life from everything around it.

There was something oddly mesmerising about the depthless black of the water, and the longer she stood in its presence, the more drawn to it she felt. It was as if the water was calling to her, and Alice took a step forward, as if in a trance. She felt like a puppet on strings, being pulled towards the water not of her own volition, but of an external force driving her.

There was no sound about her, as if the act of stepping onto the lifeless earth had caused cotton to plug her ears. Her thoughts dimmed further until there was nothing but her and the Void, and the curious compulsion to draw nearer to it.

She vaguely registered the ground underfoot changing from hard earth to soft sand and finally, something crunchy, like gravel. That faint part of her awareness that was unaffected by her situation was a little concerned. Why is there gravel here?

The rest of her mind was beguiled by the siren call of the gently lapping waters, and pushed away the nagging thought. The crunch of the material underfoot grew louder, the pieces getting larger the closer she got to the sea.

Alice bent down just before the fringe of the water, watching the stretching tendrils of liquid with a morbid fascination. Her fingers reached out towards it, but something pulled her back at the last minute, and her hand fell onto the strange pebbles that lined the shore.

She picked up a piece and rubbed her thumb along its edge absently, feeling the smooth, flat surface curve into a mini saucer. Rolling her eyes down to investigate the odd item, she found what looked like a blackened piece of shell, lit up only by the glow of her dress.

Smiling whimsically, she ran her thumb along its rounded edge, hissing sharply when it cut her.

Things happened very quickly after that.

A drop of blood fell from her thumb, splashing onto the peculiar pebbles at her feet. At the same time, she released the shell in pain, and its strange clinking as it hit its fellows seemed to be some sort of signal.

Alice belatedly realised it was the first sound she had heard in a while, but she could make no move in response to it. It was as if she had no control over her body, and was a spectator hovering alongside, watching the events unfold.

The bloodstained ground before her began caving in, a sinkhole where there was none before. The inky tendrils of water reached towards her, propelled by the tide. The water seemed to solidify into a hand with elongated fingers as they neared her, and though she was screaming at herself to move, move, move! her body refused to budge.

Hands suddenly grabbed onto her shoulders and heaved her backwards, dragging her just far enough from the water's reach. A shrill shriek burst from all around her, and she clapped her hands over her ears, the sound startling her body back into submission.

Alice watched, entranced and repulsed, as the watery arm tore at the widening sinkhole, stretching as far as the tide would allow it. The arm seemed to be looking for something, but it couldn't seem to uncover it, and so the liquid was slowly being absorbed by the earth.

Hands tapped her urgently on the shoulders, and she looked up to see a ragged boy with cat-like features holding a hand out to her.

"The water will get you if you don't move. Hurry, come with us!"

Alice was perplexed - Who is us? There's only one of him - but placed her hand in his anyway. He quickly pulled her to her feet and began running back towards the flowerbed, uncaring that she was stumbling along on wooden feet behind him.

As they neared the forest of flowers, she felt a tensing in the hand that held hers. The next moment, she was flying forward across the last few feet of barren land, falling head over heels until she finally rolled to a stop on springy grass.

The brilliant light that she was surrounded by stunned her for a few moments. It was as if a curtain had been drawn open, or a heavy cover lifted from over her eyes. Her thoughts were clear and her own, though she had faint recollections of what had just occurred, as if it had all been a strange dream.

She glanced at her hands, not knowing what to expect, but a faint part of her hoped that it had really been nothing more than a hallucination.

The smear of red on her thumb shocked her, and she quickly tore at a piece of grass to bandage the cut. So it wasn't a dream?

Startled by a sudden thought, she looked out at the Void again, and saw the faint silhouette of the lanky boy who had dragged her to sanity. With the darkness of the Void surrounding him, she couldn't make out his features.

Alice rose to her feet quickly, and cupped her hands around her mouth, calling to him. "Thank you for helping me, kind sir! May I ask your name?"

She saw the boy shake his head, and was baffled for a moment. "Whyever not?"

He held up a hand, as if to tell her to wait. Alice watched with a burning curiosity as he turned towards the side, looking as though he was speaking softly to the air about him. He nodded a few times, then gestured towards her. Finally, he bowed his head, as if in thanks, then stood straight up and faced her.

It moved subtly, and Alice didn't see it at first. There was something long and black creeping towards her from where the cat-boy stood, but it had no substance, unlike the water she had encountered earlier. It did not hit her, what it was, until the thing was right before her, waving at her hesitantly.

It was a shadow.

To be fair, she supposed it was supposed to be the cat-boy's shadow, but it looked nothing like him. Its hair was different, its build was different, and even its manner of moving seemed different.

The shadow stretched out a hand towards her and touched her shadow, pooled just under her feet. She instantly felt the genial warmth of someone else's hand grasping hers, though there was no one beside her.

Before her, the cat-boy's shadow drew her shadow's hand towards himself, leading her gently into the barren land. Attached as they were, Alice had to follow her shadow, cautiously treading back into the place where she had lost herself.

So that's what the flowers mean when they said not to lose yourself. This place really does suck the life from you.

What a frightening thing it is, to lose control like that.

Yet unlike the first time where she had set foot on it, Alice did not feel as if she were in a dream. The air she breathed was still the same, full of briny rot, but now it seemed repulsive, and she longed to turn tail and run back to the flowerbed.

The soft glow of her dress lit up the cat-boy's features, and he grinned at her as she approached him, raising a hand in greeting. "Hullo, Alice. Glad to see the Void didn't hurt you too much."

"Hello. Thank you very much for saving me from it." She cast a glance at the gently lapping waters, and the picture of innocence it depicted sent a shudder down her spine. "How is it that you are unaffected?"

The cat-boy stretched languidly and dropped to the sand, crossing his legs and patting the ground in front of him. "Mm, that's a long story. Here, sit facing me. Don't block the light from the flowerbed."

Puzzled, but compliant, Alice sat across him, and from the corner of her eye, noticed her shadow and the cat-boy's shadow sit with them.

Does he not want me to block the light so that our shadows will still be with us? Not that there's much light anyway. My dress gives off more light than the flowerbed does.

How curious, that the light of my dress is not absorbed by the Void.

Another question popped into her mind, and burst from her before she could stop herself. "Why does your shadow move independently of you?"

"Aha, that's part of the long story!" The cat-boy grinned. "But first, introductions. We're known as the Shadow Cat, me and my shadow, and yup, he's not my real shadow. He was human once, and we got joined together when we came in. It's just something that happened to us when we fell into Wonderland, y'know? Just like Cobbler and F.E. and Seamstress." He rested his head on his fist, and stretched his other hand out to poke at his shadow. The shadow shook his head minutely before his figure slumped a little. To Alice, it looked like he was giving his partner an exasperated sigh.

Alice smiled a little at their antics, absentmindedly speculating whether the cat-boy's lengthy speeches were a normal occurrence. She noticed that his shadow was still holding on to her shadow's hand, and hurriedly said to it, "U-uhm. You don't have to keep holding on to my shadow's hand, it's embarrassing."

The shadow and the cat-boy shook their heads at her in unison, before he explained. "The only reason why you can sit and talk with us now is that he's holding on to your shadow. If he didn't, you'd be losing yourself again to the Void." He jerked a thumb towards the sea for emphasis. "Part of our change here in Wonderland means we can only stick to the shadows. We live and travel by it. And of course, since we are part of the darkness, we are immune to its call. The Void only draws in those of the light, y'know." He nodded sagely at his own words, and his shadow seemed to slump again, as if it were heaving a sigh.

"By keeping a hold on your shadow, my friend here keeps you connected to us, and to the shadows. It's the only safe way to travel the area around the Void."

"Why are you here at the Void anyway?" Alice asked, her interest piqued. "Not that I am ungrateful that you have saved me, but if everyone else avoids it, why would you stay?"

"We are the Guardians of the Void, you might say." Cat-boy answered with a little shrug. He did not hesitate before dropping the bombshell, and Alice's eyes bulged, not understanding but somehow knowing that the title was important. "It's not that much of a deal, really, nothing much ever happens here. The other Guardians get all the fun."

"Who are the Guardians? I've never heard of them before."

"The Guardians are assigned to watch over specific parts of Wonderland, almost like guard dogs. Of course you wouldn't have heard of them, if you had not been an Alice and taken up the quest. It is, naturally, one of Wonderland's better kept secrets."

"Oh." Alice sat still as she digested this new information. Shadow Cat watched her patiently as she struggled to wrap her mind around it.

That sounds as if the Guardians are part of the quest. The quest must be a very well-kept secret, if it is not in any of Wonderland's documented history.

"What...what do you do here, as Guardians?" She asked carefully.

"Oh, like I said, nothing much. We watch the lake and make sure no one falls in, we try to turn travellers back, oh, and we pass on the story of the Void." Cat-boy beamed at her, his eyes glinting, and she knew that this story was a hint.

"May I please hear the story of the Void?"

"Certainly! Not many people come by here, y'know, and it gets so boring sometimes. Are you comfortable, Alice? This story really would take a while."

"Yes, I'm fine, thank you." Alice giggled inwardly at his chattiness, then tilted her head to one side as a thought occurred to her. "How did you know that I'm an Alice? Everyone else seemed surprised when I told them."

"Guardian business, missy." Cat-boy shot her a wink. "Red tells us things that others aren't allowed to know. Of course, the gossip-fishes get around as well. One came to visit almost immediately after Red sent a message. Hmm, what's that?" His shadow pulled on his arm, gesturing with his free hand. Cat-boy slapped a hand onto his forehead, as if remembering something.

"Oh right, the story! Yup, better tell you the story. You're expected elsewhere soon, can't keep you.

"Right! So, here it begins." Cat-boy straightened up and cleared his throat.

"What do you know of the original Alice's pool of tears?"

"She couldn't open the door. Since she was so big, her tears were large enough to form a sea." The old story rolled off her tongue easily, though how she knew that, she could not say.

My memories of my old world are gone, yet I recall Wonderland's history perfectly?

Cat-boy didn't seem to catch on to her internal puzzling, for he nodded and continued. "Good. And what of the poem 'The Walrus and the Carpenter'?"

"They tricked the young oysters into leaving their oyster bed, then ate them all."

"Very good. Now then, these two stories are related." He paused and gave her half a quizzical look before smirking, almost to himself. "Say, Alice. Do you want to guess how?"

Alice nodded eagerly. She may have lost her memories, but she still itched to gather information and piece it together.

Oops. Was I too quick to accept? He seemed like he wanted to continue the story, but then he gave me a choice...

I'll take the chance anyway, since he offered so kindly.

Alice turned her head to appraise the land around her, taking in the sand and the odd gravel-pebbles, as well as the encompassing darkness of the sea. Her gaze skimmed back and forth, and passed over it so quickly that she might have missed it. Checking herself, she stared at the same spot for a little longer, and it slowly began to look different from the space around it.

From a certain angle at which her head was tilted, it seemed like there was something glinting just off the far left of the sea.

"Is that the door that the original Alice couldn't fit through?" Cat-boy followed her gaze to the dull doorknob, then rewarded her with a smile, nodding for her to carry on.

"Alice's tears seeped in under the door and flooded this area, didn't they? And this place..." Alice picked up a handful of sand and let it run through her fingers. She remembered the little blackened shell she had picked up at the water's edge earlier. "This is the beach where the Walrus and the Carpenter ate those poor oysters."

"To be fair, they did choose their fate by following them. But that's another story altogether.

"You are correct, Alice. This is the final resting ground of the young, eaten oysters, a graveyard of sorts. The old oyster came and paid its last respects to them here, before it went back to the oyster bed."

Alice's mind was whirring. The lines of her quest suddenly made more sense.

'Hallowed ground'. A graveyard is hallowed ground. And 'bitter tears'. Why, the original Alice shed bitter tears because she was too large to fit in through the door!

Could the poem be that simple? The Dead Sea is full of salt, but it's no more than bitter tears.

But what about the next line? 'For tears that spill on hallowed ground will taint it with their fears.'

Alice was upset that she couldn't get through the door to get what she wanted.

Is that why the Void is this way? It drains the energy of anyone who passes by it because the sacred ground amplified Alice's wishes tenfold?

"I thought 'The Walrus and the Carpenter' was just a poem," Alice mumbled distractedly, her mind still spinning theories. Cat-boy shook his head.

"All the stories are true in Wonderland. It became a poem because it was old, old history, but it was true nonetheless."

That didn't help ease her mind. Her thoughts ricocheted around the inside of her skull, their incessant buzzing too much for her to bear. There was just too much to process. Alice drew her knees up to her chest and buried her face in them, sighing deeply.

"Penny for your thoughts, Alice."

"That's what the primrose said too," she murmured to her knees. Sitting up slightly such that her eyes peeped out from behind her knees, she addressed the Shadow Cat.

"There's just too much to think about. Can you please tell me the story of the Void, so I can see if I got some of it right? I'm sick of thinking." She gave him a tired smile.

To her surprise, he reached over and patted her hand. "It's alright, Alice. Wonderland is confusing. It's a wonder you made it this far without going crazy.

"Now then." He settled back into a sitting position and cleared his throat noisily. "Let us begin.

"The land you now sit upon is the final resting ground of the young, foolish oysters, who were tricked from their bed by the Walrus and the Carpenter. After they had left, the old oyster took the long trek to this beach to say its final farewells. It could not bury the shells, for it was old, and it was not the custom to bury the shells of eaten comrades. It simply said some words of remorse, then turned around to return to its bed.

"Now, this was curious, because oysters do not usually care for others. It is ingrained into their natures, much like the shells they wear on their backs. Perhaps it was because they were young, or perhaps because they were so many lost, that the old oyster felt compelled to say its goodbyes, but in doing so, it consecrated the ground on which they lay, and made it a great gathering point for anyone who wished for safe haven for a day or two.

"Of course, Alice couldn't have known that when she came upon the door. The door," Cat-boy pointed towards the tarnished doorknob, "Was not meant to stay in the same place for any one time. It moves, changing its destination as it sees fit, only stopping when someone approaches it with the key. After it has been unlocked and the person gone through, it will change destinations again, so that no two people will ever end up in the same place.

"However, Alice never did unlock it. She forgot the key, and cried her pool of tears. The door was swamped by the tears, and its internal mechanisms got flooded, rusting the metal, such that even if she did get the key, she could not have unlocked it.

"It is said that Alice's saddened spirit still sits behind the door, crying giant tears. Because of that, the door can never move, for she wants to enter, and the key is with her. All the while, her tears keep seeping in under the door and through the keyhole, damaging it and feeding this lake.

"I said earlier that this place was a place of safe haven for those who needed it, and fortunately - or not - for Alice, she was swept in here by her own tears after she had shrunk to the size of a mouse. (T'was the White Rabbit's fan that shrunk her, do remember that.)

"Now, if you remember the story, Alice met with a group of birds and small animals who had fallen into the pool of her tears, and they had a race and a talk after getting out of the wet. During their chat, Alice frightened the poor animals so with her talk of cats and being eaten that they fled with scared hearts.

"It was their fright that caused the sanctuary of this area to lose its spirit of peace, and the aura of terror that had first encompassed it when the young oysters had been eaten returned.

"It was a slow re-poisoning, caused first by Alice's words, and then by the infusion of her tears in the waters of the sea.

"Don't be confused, Alice! Oysters come from the sea, aye? And so this area before the original Alice came was a sea. But her tears poisoned the waters, drying up the sea and replacing them wholly with their bitterness.

"The land was exposed as the tears caused the waters to recede, and the tears would have disappeared long ago into a pool of its own destruction if it were not for the constant supply through the door.

"For that reason, this lake of tears will never be gone, and as it remains, it seeks to steal the life from those that approach it, to make up for what it lost by not being able to unlock the door."

Cat-boy fell silent, his tale complete. Alice muffled a groan in the folds of her dress.

Now my brain hurts even more.

Taking a few deep breaths to calm her thoughts, she lifted her head and fixed him with a determined stare. "Alright, I believe I understand. This story is to help me understand my quest, isn't it?"

"Very good, Alice. You're not so confused after all."

"Well, yes, but I still don't understand what I have to do. How am I supposed to stop the Void from hurting anyone else if it might kill me when I touch it?"

Cat-boy smiled at her. "You're not as foolish as the rest, Alice. What do you think?"

Alice propped her chin on her knees, gazing at the black waters listlessly. "I could stop it at the source, I suppose. You mentioned that the spirit of the original Alice might be behind that door. If I could get her to stop crying, the tears will dry themselves up."

"Well, then. If you've got it all figured out already, why are you still here?"

"I don't know... Wait, I figured it out?" Alice looked at him in horror. Cat-boy shrugged.

"An unfinished plan is still a plan, by Wonderland means. Come on, let's go! Time's a-wasting, Alice!"

"But I still don't know what I want to do! I can't cross the Void, even if I wanted to get to the door." She protested as he pulled her to her feet.

"We're not the Guardians of the lake for nothing, Alice. Just ask." His eyes shone with a barely concealed secret, and the words popped out of her mouth, as if on impulse.

"Will you please take me to the door at the end of the Void?"

Cat-boy grinned his wide smile, his tone gleeful.

"Of course. Thought you'd never ask."