Fast As You Can - Part I

Alice runs forever. Her lungs burn and her legs feel like jelly but she's scared that she'll turn around and he'll be right behind her, saying the impossible.

She wants to hit something, maybe him, because she was pretty sure that she'd left this all behind her. Wasn't it enough to watch her father die? To race across another dimension, as she's determined to identify it, only to find out that the man she'd risked her life saving didn't need it, or merit it? She's been kidnapped and beaten, fallen a hundred feet into a freezing cold lake, twice, so no sir, she has no intention of going back. But he isn't asking her that, is he?

She finds herself on a bench in a park not far from her apartment. She hangs her head and buries her hands in her hair.

This was just like him, or men in general, to come all this way only to disappoint her. Except that save for the one instance where he tried to barter away her possessions, he's surpassed all of her expectations. He stayed when she expected him to run. Rushed headlong into danger when she half imagined he would hide behind a rock.

Damn him.

Alice feels the familiar prickling in her eyes. She takes a deep breath and tries to reel it in. Crying won't do her any good. Besides, if she cried every time things got tough, well, she might as well not get out of bed.

She won't cry but she damn well deserves to be angry.

Hadn't she paid her dues? Doesn't she deserve to be happy? She thinks the answer is yes. But is that what she'll be, sitting at home knowing what Hatter was heading back to face? Would she find this elusive happiness chasing another man through that looking glass? And if she goes through with it, agrees to be a knight or champion or whatever, what then?

Alice sits back against the creaking wood and grinds her teeth against the tears. She doesn't want to save the world. Hell, teaching has been her biggest responsibility so far and she's perfectly fine with that. In all the things she imagined for herself, saving a magical kingdom is on the very bottom of some unknown, non-existent list that she's never had.

No, she doesn't want to save the world. But she doesn't want to lose anyone else.

For the first time in years, she's found someone that might actually be worth fighting for. Although, she thinks bitterly, she never thought the sentiment would be so literal.

The air is crisp and the streets are empty, something she's grateful for. She can still hear her pulse pounding in her ears and her stomach is full of angry knots.

She feels her world start to tilt and she leans forward and holds her head in her hands to counteract the wave of nausea.

When did this become my life?

There are so many other questions, of course, but this one demands to be answered. At what point did the universe decide that she would be a champion in some damned fairy tale? Was Hatter right? Had her destiny been written long before she was born and everything, every single thing she's known up until this point has been nothing, meant nothing?

It's a terrible feeling to doubt your existence, to question all that you thought was yours, all the reasons you think you are. It's a terrible thing knowing that everything you know doesn't mean anything in the face of magic and kingdoms and broken hearts.

Her chest has been hollowed, filled with pain instead of air. She feels empty and used up. And no matter what she does, she can't stop the heaving, the bone wrenching sobs that take over her, squeeze and tighten and take all of her strength. She lets it come this time and she hopes that at the very least, this will be the last time she cries over, of all things, another man that's gone and broken her heart.

It must be hours before she can control the tears and the hiccups. It feels like days since she's last opened her mouth to say even a word. The world has been kind, for once, and she hasn't seen nor heard a peep from the people walking around her.

She presses her palms against her eyes to stop the burning. Devoid of her anger, Alice takes this quiet time to digest everything Hatter told her.

Just because she didn't want to hear it didn't mean it wasn't happening.

If what he said is true, war was coming to Wonderland.

She lets that settle in her chest for a few minutes. It doesn't terrify her like it did when the words fell from his mouth. Now...now there's a sense of inevitability about it, as if it's already been decided. As if her heart knew before her mind did that she had to go back.

But why?