AN "Blah"- Normal speech
'Blah'- Thoughts
"Blah"- Lyrics

Neon Genesis Evangelion
Rei Wonderland
Proof read by Katherine Hockey

Chapter 9: Pig and Pepper
As Rei approached the house, a footman came running out of the woods and knocked on the door. The sound echoed in the still air, drawing Rei's attention. Somehow, she was not surprised to see that the footman had the oversized head of a fish, and seemed to be breathing just fine out of water. The fish was clad in a very smart navy dress uniform, with a curled, powdered wig upon its head. A few seconds later, the door was opened by another footman. If Rei had been anyone else, she would have groaned. This footman had a frog's head, and was dressed in the same uniform as the fish; heavy dark blue wool adorned with a complicated gold braid, yellow piping and tassels.

Slightly curious as to what was occurring, Rei crept closer to listen, polished ebony shoes quiet against the dew-slick grass.

The fish produced an oversized scroll from under its arm and presented regally it to the frog, almost as careful as if it was a divine summon. "For the Duchess," it announced solemnly, "An invitation from the Queen to come play croquet."

"An invitation from the Queen for the Duchess to come play croquet." The frog footman echoed in the same grave tone. The two bowed deeply to each other until they clashed heads, causing their stiff white-curled wigs to become entangled.

At the sight of the two flailing to come apart, Rei let out a small, soft giggle. She stopped and quickly ducked back into the woods. 'Did I just laugh?' The action confused her greatly, almost to the point of shock. She had never laughed before – she'd never had cause to - and she was not entirely sure why she did just then.

By the time she emerged from the woods, the fish was gone. The frog was lazing idly on the lawn, the very picture of idleness. His vivid green arms were folded behind his head as a makeshift pillow. One leg was bent slightly, the other foot balanced on the opposite knee. His ink-black eyes were focused on the clear blue sky, where fluffy wisps of cloud drifted.

Rei walked past him, timidly approaching the door. Her fingers curled into a timid fist, and she brought them to the thick wood, rapping smarty.

"There's no use in knocking."

Turning to glance over her shoulder, Rei saw that the frog was talking to her. "The first reason's 'cause I'm out here with you. The second, and way more important reason, is that they're making so much noise inside they'll never hear you."

Listening more closely, Rei could hear a great deal of commotion coming from within. She recognized sound of a yelling voice, accompanied by some kind of pained howling and the faint chime of china shattering. "How am I to get in?" She asked.

"There might be some sense in you knocking. If you were inside, I could let you out." The footman replied, still looking intently up at the sky. Rei knew that many people considered it rude when a person did not look at you whilst speaking. However, the frog creature was an amphibian with his eyes on the top of his head, so the rule might not apply, she considered.

"How am I to get in?" she repeated.

"I shall sit here until tomorrow…" Without warning, the front door swung open and a patterned plate came skimming out, gliding straight over the footman's head to shatter against a nearby tree, "or the next day, or maybe longer."

"How am I to get in?" Rei asked for the third time, raising her normally quiet voice. Perhaps he had not heard her…

"How are you to get in at all? That is the first question." the footman replied, shifting on the ground slightly as if to get more comfortable. "I shall sit here, on and off, for day and days."

"What am I to do?" Rei asked, feeling a rare prick of annoyance.

"Anything you like." The footman replied, glancing at her for a moment. He returned his eyes to the sky, whistling the opening notes to an indolent tune.

Realizing that she was getting nowhere with the footman, Rei opened the front door and stepped inside. The door led to a large kitchen. Rei looked about, unable to see much of the interior, vision clouded by the smoke that stretched from one end of the room to the other. Through the oppressive gloom, Rei caught a glimpse of something she had never expected to see.

Sitting on a three-legged stool and nursing a baby was Sub-Commander Fuyutsuki. The usually dignified man was wearing a decorative frock, all bright colors and floral prints. A regale-looking velvet hat, trimmed with peacock plumage, was perched at a jaunty angle over his steel-gray hair. Heavy layers of garish makeup, almost as heavy as that of a kabuki dancer, obscured his face.

The stove behind the former professor held an enormous cauldron, filled to the brim with some kind of bubbling liquid. A few sizzling drops sizzled past, narrowly avoiding the redheaded girl standing behind it. Asuka Langley Sohryu was just managing to avoid a scalding, but she seemed almost oblivious. She was holding a ridiculously oversized pepper grinder, turning it furiously.

A few feet away, Ryoji Kaji sat on a cushion, flashing his habitual grin. His shaggy dark hair crept down to his shoulders as usual, but, for once, it was not bound a rubber band. Cat's ears poked out of his thick locks, and a feline tail flicked lazily in the air behind him. Somehow Rei could not find it in her to be surprised, not even when Mister Kaji began licking at the back of his hand.

Rei sneezed, and reached into a pocket of her apron for a handkerchief. There was way too much pepper in that soup. Hell, there was way too much pepper in the air. She did not seem to be the only one to be affected by this. Even the Sub-Commander sneezed occasionally, and the baby was sneezing and howling alternately, without a moment's pause for breath. The only ones who seemed to be immune were Pilot Sohryu and Agent Kaji.

The blue-haired girl's sneeze, innocuous as it was compared to the rest of the madness, was enough to attract the attention of the others in the room.

"And who might you be?" 'Fuyutsaki' asked in a regal voice.

"I am Rei Ayanami, Sub-Commander Fuyutsaki." Rei replied. "May I ask you are dressed like that, why Pilot Sohryu is at that stove and why Agent Kaji is dressed up like a cat and why he's grinning like that?"

"Sub-Commander? Sub-Commander? I will have you know that I am the Duchess and don't you forget it." The Duchess replied, sounding outraged. "Anyway that girl behind me is merely the cook and, finally, the reason that the cat is grinning like that is because it's a Cheshire cat, pig."

This surprised Rei. In fact, the last word had been said with such violent force it caused her to jump slightly. "I was unaware that cats could grin." She said the moment she managed to compose herself.

"They all can and most do." The Duchess replied as he returned to his seat.

"I am unacquainted with any that do." Rei said to him after a moment.

"You don't know much, do you? And that is a fact." He replied.

Rei was unsure of how to respond to this. As she struggled to think of a response, 'Sohryu' took the cauldron from the fire then went back to throwing everything within reach at the Duchess and the baby, including fire-irons, saucepans, plates, dishes. The Duchess seemed oblivious to all this, even as a copper frying pan hit him in the side of the head. Rei was kneeling on the floor next to the cat, in an effort to keep out of the line of fire. 'This is insane.'

"If everyone minded their own business the world would turn a great deal faster then it does." The Duchess said, more to himself then anyone in particular.

"I do not see how that would be an advantage," Rei said to him, uncurling somewhat from her nervous spot on the floor. "If the earth revolved any faster on its axis…"

"Speaking of axes," the Duchess said casually, "Chop off her head." Rei's eyes widened in horror. However, 'Sohryu' had gone back to stirring the soup and no one else showed up to take her away. The Duchess went back to nursing the baby, singing it a lullaby. He shook it violently at the end of each line.

Speak roughly to your little boy's,
And beat him when he sneezes.
He only does it to annoy,
Because he knows it teases

He sung the chorus, which 'Sohryu' and the baby seemed to join in with.
Wow, wow, wow

I speak severely to my boy,
I beat him when he sneezes
For he can enjoy the pepper
When he pleases

Wow, wow, wow.

The Duchess rose from his stool and tossed the baby to Rei, who was only just able to catch it. "Here you hold him for a while. I must go get ready to play croquet with the queen." He exited the room – just before a plate aimed at his head could hit him. The baby in Rei's arms kept thrashing about, flailing its arms and legs, doubling over and straightening out again, snorting and grunting. For the first minute or two, it was all Rei could do to hold on to it.

After getting the baby to stop thrashing, Rei took it out into the fresh air. "The child will die if I left it in that kitchen with those two – I might as well have murdered the child myself." She said as they made their way out the front door and into the sunshine. The baby grunted in reply. "Do not grunt." She told it, "It is not a polite thing to do." But it only grunted again.

'Maybe it is sick.' Rei thought and looked down at it. The baby had a very turned up nose, much more like a snout. Also its beady black eyes seemed rather small for an infant. "Perhaps it is crying." Looking at the babies face to see if there were any tears, but there weren't any. Frustration began welling up inside Rei. "If you're going to turn into a pig, I'll have nothing more to do with you." The child began sobbing…or grunting. It was difficult to tell which.

'What am I to do with this creature? If I return to Tokyo 3 I sure that Commander Ikari will not approve of it and it would disposed of.' The child grunted again; this time so violently that Rei's attention was caught immediately. What she saw caused her to raise her eyebrows in surprise. It was now pretty clear that the creature she was carrying was, indeed, a pig. Though she wasn't familiar with the feeling, she was feeling quite embarrassed for lugging it all this time.

"Oh…well, maybe it is a good thing that it is a pig." She said to herself as she set it on the grass, watching it scamper towards the forest. "I'm sure if it had grown up it would it would have been a rather unattractive child but it should make a rather good pig."

"I heartily agree with you, dear girl." a rather familiar voice said but, looking around, Rei could see no one. "Why don't you try up here?"

Looking up into the branches of the tree above her, Rei saw Kaji – or rather the Cheshire cat – grinning down at her. Though she had never really spoken to him, Rei was aware of the government agents good nature from overheard conversations (though Major Katsuragi referred to him as a jerk, not that she knew what that meant) but was also aware of his divided loyalties between NERV, the Japanese's government and NERV's parent organisation SEELE. Maybe, just maybe, he might be able to help her. "Agent Kaji, could you tell me the way I should go from here?" She asked, her tone only slightly louder then the one she normally used.

"Well, that depends a great deal on where you are trying to get to." The Cheshire cat replied, his grin becoming broader.

"I am not too concerned about where I go--"

"Then it matters not where you go then." The Cheshire cat interrupted her.

"…as long as I am able to return to the room with all the doors." Rei finished.

"Oh, I'm sure you'll come to it eventually, if you walk for long enough." The Cheshire cat said as it shifted itself so that it was now reclining on the branch.

Rei thought about its answer, trying to find some logic within it. "Of what sort are the people whom dwell here." She asked when she could find none.

"Weeeeell, to the right is the house of the Hatter." The Cheshire cat said, rolling over and using its tail to indicate the directions as he spoke. "To the left is where the March Hair dwells. You may visit either, if you wish. They are both utterly barking mad."

"I would rather speak with someone who isn't mad."

"In that case, I'm afraid you're out of luck." The cat's toothy grin was stretching so wide that it looked rather painful to maintain. "For we are all mad here, everybody! Especially you."

"Me? What makes you think I am mad?" Rei asked, very confused.

"Well, you must be." The cat replied. "If you weren't, you would not be here."

Rei stared at him and could see his point. This made her worry slightly. "What makes you think that you are mad?"

"A dog is not mad. When a dog is mad, it growls and it wags its tail when it not." It said. Rei, however, stared at him blankly. "I however I growl when I am happy and wag my tail when I and angry it is mad utterly ludicrous." Rei may not have known much about cats, but she was fairly sure the growling it was referring to was called purring. "Do you play croquet, dear girl?"

"No." Rei responded.

"Go to the Queen's castle, you shall see me there." The cat said, before it began disappearing until the only thing that was visible was the grin, which remained for some time before disappearing as well. To Rei this was quite a sight. Before coming here, she had never seen a cat with a grin. Now, not only had she seen that; she had now seen a grin without a cat.

She began waking away until she came to a fork in the road with a sign post with Hatter written upon one, whilst the other said Hare. "I suppose I could try the Hare. Maybe it will be slightly less mad then the Hatter." She decided and headed along the left path, keeping towards the middle of the path, occasionally sparing a glance to the woods that surrounded her.

After a while, she came in sight of the house of the March Hare. There were two chimneys on the roof that were shaped like ears; the roof itself was thatched with what looked like fur. Looking at the large building, Rei took some of the mushroom out of her left pocket and nibbled it slightly. She began to shrink, and took small nibbles of it until she was about two feet high, before continuing her journey towards it. While she crossed the clearing to the house, she realized that she was starting to rather regret not going to see the Hatter instead.


AN. Well finally the new chapter of this story sorry it took so long it was just a thing with a lack of motivation, uni, work and life in genral but I promise this fic will be completed, chap 10 and next chapters of 'Enermy' and (for toughs of you have read my Star Ocean stuff) Reunionare in the works. Please send me your reviews cos I need my fix. Hope y'all had a good Christmas & New Year. Later.