A/N: First matter of business, Jhinra and James Birdsong are the most awesome reviewers, and I just realized I neglected all the people who favorited/alerted this story, so 'thank you's also go to Jhinra, but she already reviews, and zombiepie, yeah, she's the only other one. Well, turns out I'm something of a liar, cause I was lying without realizing it, I do that a lot, which is why my sister really does know me better than anyone else, because she can tell I'm lying when even I don't know I'm lying. What I mean is, appearently, there's still a good bit before the story is over, we're only about, halfway to two-thrids, through the story, because I plan for it to have either fifteen or twenty chapters now. This is because appearently what I wrote for the chapter after next, what happens after that, takes up a few more chapters than I had anticipated, and of course there's going to be an epilouge, possibly two if I think about it, and I still need to get Alice out of her predicament, which might take a while, especially since in school, I'm going to be busy, the semester is nearly over and Christmas break is coming up, so that means more projects, tests, and finals, which reminds me, I need to get started on turning my notes into a powerpoint, I need to get a notebook to paste my notes into, I have another powerpoint I really should get started on for French class, and I still have a lab report eleven more textbook questions, and a chapter summary to do for chem class that's all due tomorrow, *smackheadondesk* why do I do this to myself, I might be the Queen of Procrastination, but can I really do this? Find out next time in, A/N! Only on .
RER, Read, Enjoy, Review!
The Queen was a beautiful woman, with long flowing hair of golden sunshine and eyes of blue sapphire, and although Alice could tell she was about as old as Mother was, the Queen just somehow made the age seem so much younger than Mother could ever dream of doing.
"Well child, answer me." the Queen said, growing quite upset with Alice who instead had just been staring at her with awe.
"Um, that is, I was lost, I somehow ended up some ways outside the home of the Mad Hatter and the March Hare, and they told me to find my way-"
"Your way?" the Queen asked, disrupting Alice's explanation, Alice was a bit confused by this, "This is my queendom, there is only my way."
"Well, I tried to find your way to your castle, since-"
"Very well then, but that doesn't quite matter, for we are about to start a game which I do truly love, and you will play with us, understood?" the Queen replied, and Alice was very quickly handed a bright pink flamingo and a purple hedgehog while the remaining soldiers, all of varying suits and numbers, arched themselves off the ground and the Queen set down her hedgehog, a bright, deep red color, while numerous other people joined the game, all with different colored hedgehogs.
While Alice awaited her turn for the game, which she found to simply be croquet, which she was really quite good at in truth; a man came up and stood next to her, he was very tall, with black hair that ran in a short tail behind him, Alice thought it just a bit strange, but otherwise paid it no mind, he stood next to her very quietly for a long time before suddenly turning to her and staring at her with brown eyes and saying, "I am the King of Hearts, it is a pleasure to meet you, um."
"Oh, I am Alice, Your Majesty." Alice replied, curtsying to him, she was really quite surprised to find that there was a king, she had assumed that there was none, what with all the focus on the queen and all, it was even called a queendom rather than a kingdom.
"Well, I trust you have had a pleasant stay so far here." the King suggested while looking on at the game, "You have, haven't you?"
"Um, well, considering my situation, I do believe it has been going fairly well." Alice replied, believing herself to have replied in a good manner that neither offended the king nor was too far off from the truth.
"Ah, that's good." the King replied, "It appears to be your turn." he told her and realizing it was indeed her turn, Alice hurried out to make her move.
Alice set the hedgehog on the ground before her and grabbed the flamingo to hit it, but the flamingo's head reared up while the hedgehog rolled away and then the flamingo decided to mess with Alice and tried to run under her dress while she still held it by its legs. This made Alice fall over completely and the flamingo and hedgehog both laughed loudly at her and when everyone else noticed what happened to her, they too started laughing at her.
The Queen seemed to instead grow extremely angry with everyone's laughter, and everyone noticed this, so their laughter stopped leaving only the sounds of Alice's struggle with the flamingo and the hedgehog. The Queen quietly approached the struggle, and glared down at them, the hedgehog was the first to notice, so he rolled up into a ball and rolled away as quickly as he could, which was much faster than one would have assumed for a hedgehog to roll away, then the flamingo noticed, so he flapped away from the scene like his wings were on fire. Alice was the only one left and she was rearranging her dress, then she realized how the Queen glared down at her, she carefully rose to her feet, head still down, and awaited scolding from the woman.
"Never, let that take place again." were the only harshly said words that left the Queen's mouth as she turned around quickly, dress swishing about her in silent anger, and walked away towards her own croquet set.
Alice felt immensely better once the Queen had left, and decided that since she could not find her croquet equipment again, she would instead stand to the side; while she was scolded, the King had left his place and went off to talk with someone else, but she was instead joined by, of all people, the Duchess.
"Oh, Alice my dear, how frightening that must have been, greater people than you have gotten on her worse side for less." she told Alice.
"Um, thank you for your concern, Duchess." Alice replied, wondering just what it meant to be on the Queen's bad side.
"Oh, did you hear about the trial that is supposed to take place today?" the Duchess asked, Alice was easily able to tell by her eager tone, that like many of the maids in the house that Alice lived in, the Duchess was a gossiper, and she did not even await a response from Alice before continuing, "It's against that man who tried to kill Sir Time all those years ago, well, I suppose you would have been too young to recall it, how old are you dear, what seven, before you were even born, it happened over ten years ago."
"I would have been four then." Alice replied, trying to stand straighter, hoping it would make her look older.
"Yes, yes, dear, well, it was also around that time that the Princess of Hearts went missing, poor girl, only four at the time, everyone was certain that it was the same person who tried to kill Sir Time that kidnapped the Princess, but they recently found that man, and he said he barely saw a glimpse of the girl when he was in the castle, and besides that, there was no trace whatsoever within his abode that a girl might have lived there at any time, oh and listen to this, he was living with another man, and they had only one bed between them." the Duchess waggled her eyebrows, as though hinting at something, but Alice, being quite naive and innocent, did not understand the innuendo, she merely believed that the Duchess was implying that the two men were so poor that one of them had the bed to sleep in while the other slept on the ground.
Alice turned to look as there suddenly seemed to be some sort of commotion at a nearby entrance, mostly from women who were swooning over something or other.
"Oh, it seems the White Rabbit is finally back, oh my, he's such a handsome young man, any woman, even a young girl such as yourself, would be lucky to have his attention for even a second."
"You don't mean, Aaron Earsten, do you?" Alice asked, for in that she would have to not agree with the Duchess, having found the man to be quite rude when she met him for the first time ever some time ago, although then again, she had snuck into his house and was mistaken for his house maid, and according to him, was doing a very bad job at her work.
"Is there any other?" the Duchess asked with a smirk on her face, "Ah, if only I were just ten years younger," Alice immediately amended this statement for the woman in her head, changing the ten to a fifty, "I would have that poor man wrapped around my little finger I tell you."
"What did you mean by, 'finally back'?" Alice asked, curious as to what was the reason for him being gone for so long.
"Oh well, you see, it's supposed to be a secret, so naturally everyone knows, it's rumored, that he might have found the missing Princess of Hearts." the Duchess replied, "Of course, it's yet to be affirmed if he did indeed find her, or if that was even the reason he left in the first place."
Alice merely nodded as she looked over at the man who was now surrounded by the female members of the party, who all seemed to be swooning over him. Alice on the other hand just looked on strangely, admittedly she did read many fairy tales with handsome princes and she supposed the White Rabbit counted as handsome; but since she already knew him to have a bad personality, she could not bring herself to care for him to any degree other than that she considered him rude.
The Duchess continued talking about gossip, and while not Alice's favorite subject or something she understood at all, Alice attempted to stay concentrated on the conversation, alas, she failed, and her mind wandered away. Thankfully the Duchess was a large talker and never really asked questions or expected replies it seemed. Alice was quite glad for this because now the Duchess was talking about politics and the economy, which were things Alice understood even less about.
"Well, it is now time for the trial!" the Queen announced, and so everyone started filing away towards some segment of the maze, and the Duchess dragged Alice along before she could even think of arguing against going.
Off Alice went, to the trial that would soon change what she had last supposed of her life.