Chapter Ten
Authors Note:
I saw the Alice in Wonderland movie, which was excellent. Then I got their music CD, which was also good. Then I read a bunch of Alice fanfiction and looked at a bunch of Alice fanart, most of which was also phenomenal.
Really, I was helpless to do anything but do an Alice in Wonderland chapter.
Also, I'm going to go ahead and put all of the parts of Chapter Nine into one chapter, so if you see the story chapter count is suddenly two less, that's why.
0
Lewis woke up from a nap he hadn't meant to take at two in the afternoon, looked blearily at the sunny day outside of the hospital window, and though his body ached and his burns stung and his eyes were desperately trying to keep him from falling asleep again, he enjoyed for a moment the warmth of the sun against his face.
There was a great deal of a difference between the heat of the sun and the heat of flames ready to consume you and the people you love.
Lewis blinked at this thought, mulling it over in his head. Orphan children have a naturally difficult time learning the concept of love; for most children, love was learned from their natural instincts towards their parents, and immediate family. After that, it was typically easy to turn that pure love towards siblings, and then towards friends, and then, depending on how their experience growing up was, towards the world in general.
For an orphan child, especially one that was orphaned at birth, love was a far more difficult thing to grasp. Most orphans are moved from place to place throughout their lives, and though they might come to care about the people they stayed with, there was always the knowledge about how easily these people could be lost, as their natural family had been. Lewis was one of the lucky ones, who had had one consistent guardian, Mildred, who had been kind to him his entire life. But though he, in a way, loved Mildred, and she him, there had always been that wall, put in by Mildred herself, that so when the day came that Lewis was adopted he'd be happy to go, rather than mourning her. Lewis, being incredibly smart for his age, had always understood and accepted this, but it had also led to him never really truly loving someone his entire life…unless, of course, you counted his intense desire for his real mother, who he had yet to even meet.
Lewis closed his eyes against the sun, and saw the four people he had been talking to this morning. Since the hospital had a strict two patience per room policy, he and Wilbur had been sharing a room together, but at the first of morning Goob, Franny and Bryan had all found a way into their room, and the five of them had spent all morning talking about, what else, the night before.
Goob and Franny had explained exactly how they had gotten out. Apparently, they had managed to get to one of the edges of the hospital through the vents, and while they were trying to find a way out, the firemen had chanced upon them, taking out the walls and then grabbing them as soon as they saw them. Both Goob and Franny had been covered in bruises, far more then when they had left Lewis and Bryan; Goob's eye was swollen completely shut, and somehow Franny had gotten such a nasty injury on her arm that, though it wasn't broken, it would still need to be in a slink for a few days. Franny said she had gotten it when they had fallen out of the vent, but then she and Goob had shared a look that hinted there was more to the story. Lewis hadn't asked.
He saw them in his mind eye, those two tiny black haired friends, saw their injuries, remembered how relieved he had been when he had saw them alive and well, how intense that feeling had been, and wondered if this was what people meant when they said they loved their friends. Lewis had also been somewhat of a cynic about such statements, believing in love, but also believing people threw around that word too casually, hadn't ever really believed that you could love someone you weren't related or married too.
Did he love them? He wasn't sure, but he was beginning to suspect that the answer was yes. This was not necessarily a good thing. Love was a very risky business for an orphan child who's waiting for someone, anyone, from any part of the country to come take them away…
Then another image burned into his mind: Bryan. This one completely confused Lewis, because though he hadn't yet even known Bryan for twenty hours yet, his feelings towards Bryan were very close to what he was feeling towards Goob and Franny. Lewis had heard of this, of course; you saw cases of it all the time, in news reports like 9/11 or Hurricane Katrina, where people who barely know each other being stuck together in a crisis situation and becoming extremely close, extremely fast because of it. A theory he had read about once, just by chance, had stated that these sudden feelings of intimacy was because during a crisis, in order to survive you have to learn extremely fast to trust the person you're trying to survive with, so all the walls, all the social dances people put themselves through in order to get close to someone in a normal situation are thrown aside in the name of survival. Basically, that Lewis had learned everything he needed to really know about Bryan in a few hours instead of months, because he had needed to know.
Bryan was temporarily in a wheelchair due to a severe burn on his leg, but otherwise he was well enough to be discharged, and would soon be able to go home. There was still, however, the debate about where 'home' was, since his last place of residence had just burned down, and Lewis wondered if his fretting over this, if his genuine concern over what happened to Bryan, was a sort of love as well…
Then, of course, the last one, and most confusing one of all: Wilbur, his stalker, his friend… his 'son'. Wilbur, who had apparently loved Lewis the first second he saw him, the way any 'child' would love his 'father'.
Lewis opened his eyes and stared miserably at the ceiling; there was so much wrong with that last thought that Lewis could barely wrap his rather formidable brain around it.
Again Lewis closed his eyes and immediately saw Wilbur, who was currently off somewhere in the hospital with the other kids. He saw the Wilbur from this morning, who had looked over at him from his bed and had smiled warily, eyes wrinkling around the stitches that bordered them, new, similar looking cuts how all over his arms that Lewis had as of yet been too tired, and frankly a little afraid, too ask about. Wilbur hadn't been his usual up-beat self that morning, but after the insanity of the night before this didn't concern Lewis too much, deciding it was probably just fatigue or shock. Still, Wilbur had seemed distracted all morning, staring curiously into the air, frowning, as if seeing just barely something that troubled him deeply. Other than to answer some questions about the night before, Lewis had barely spoken to Wilbur that morning, not because he was upset about the 'father' confession, though that still worried him greatly...
It was just, that…looking at the banged up, distressed Wilbur actually seemed to physically hurt. Lewis would be reminded of the night before, seeing Wilbur tied up and beaten down with that…that wide-eyed, eerie look on his face, counting to a hundred behind a mask that was meant for other people's protection…
That image made Lewis want throw a chair into a wall and curl up and cry, all at the same time. He was so scared for Wilbur that to keep himself from shaking he had to constantly turn his mind away from the boy, but at the same time this fear made him so mad that he wanted to destroy everything in sight…and yet, he still couldn't hate Wilbur for all the misery the boy had added to his life.
Was that love? Was a feeling so intense, so frightening, so dangerous…was that love? Not the kind between lovers, but not the kind between friends either. Was it love?
Lewis was beginning to think it was. He had absolutely no idea what to do with that information.
He didn't want to care about Wilbur. He didn't know why, but he knew that caring about Wilbur would mean something different then caring about Goob and Franny and Bryan; he got the vaguest sense that if he cared about Wilbur, he would lose something…but what?
Lewis had always thought love was something straightforward, that even if it wasn't easy, it also wasn't difficult to identify, or to figure out the source. If he had to describe it, he supposed he had thought love was like a Dr. Suess book; it was twisty and curvy, and needed an open mind to understand it, but point A typically lead to B, all the way to Z. There was rhyme and reason, and it was simple to spot both.
Instead, Lewis now realized love was more madness, like a poem from an Alice in Wonderland book: you kind of got a sense that, if you look at it the right way, the poem might actually be saying something, and you always get the vague impression that whatever it's saying actually really is relevant to what's going on; however, beyond that you're as confused as the main character, Alice, was.
He wondered if he would have to deal with love the same way Alice had had to deal with those poems: kind of just go along with it and hope his lack of understanding didn't bite him in the butt later. That method had worked fairly well for Alice. He had a feeling it wouldn't go quite as neatly for him.
Suddenly, his room door banged open, and Goob ran inside, his good eye wide open as he huffed, "Lewis, come quickly! They're taking them away! They're taking Wilbur and Bryan away!"
1
When the two boys got to Stephen's room, where the four had been hanging out while Lewis slept, an old woman was filling out some paperwork as a stunned looking Bryan seemed to be stammering through some questions two doctor looking people were asking him. Wilbur was sitting on Bryan's bed, a similar stunned look on his face, and Lewis wondered if the doctors had already interrogated Wilbur as they were Bryan. Franny was nowhere to be seen.
"I-I don't understand!" Lewis heard Bryan exclaim, "What do you mean you're sending me to a hospital out of the state!? I can't just leave, my whole life is here!"
"We understand that, Bryan," one of the doctors said kindly, writing something into his clipboard, "But all the mental hospitals in nearby cities are full, the closest place that would take you is in the next state over. Now, you know that you're grandmother can't take care of you, I'm afraid this is the only option…"
"Can't I just go home to my parents?! I'm only supposed to be in here for a few weeks!" Bryan insisted, "Why can't I just go home!?"
The two doctors looked at each other, the other doctor then saying very tenderly, "Bryan, you've been told this numerous times, and I understand you don't like it, but we'll say it again; you're parents, along with your brother, are dead. They've been dead for over a year. You've been in the hospital for over a year. Do you remember that?"
Lewis, Goob, and Wilbur watched, stunned, as Bryan gave the doctors a confused look before saying, "What are you saying? I can't hear you. Why are you mumbling? Why can't I just go home?"
The doctors gave each other a sigh that said, 'we tried', before the first doctor said simply, "You just have too, Bryan. You're grandmother agrees with us. Now, we were going to ship you out today, but there's a nasty storm coming, so you'll stay for another night, and then you'll leave tomorrow morning on a bus with the other patients. That goes for you too, young man," The doctor said sternly to Wilbur, who glared at him in retaliation. Apparently, while Lewis was asleep, 'words' had exchanged. Wilbur never had been very good at talking to adults…
"Lewis, do something," Goob whispered, "They're taking them out of the state. We'll never see either of them again!"
Lewis thought guiltily, 'maybe that wouldn't be such a bad thing.' He turned to Goob and asked, "What am I supposed to do? Bryan's grandmother has custody over him, and…well, you just saw what happened. I think Bryan needs some real help. We shouldn't mess with that."
"But what about Wilbur?" Goob insisted.
Lewis looked over at Wilbur. The teen was staring out the window miserably, and seemed completely oblivious to everyone else in the room. Lewis stared at him for a long time, and a voice in the back of his head whispered, 'If you help him, you're going to lose it…'
'Lose what?'
His mind didn't reply. This sometimes happened in the middle of when he was inventing something, when a part of his brain knew something and was waiting for the rest of him to catch up. There wasn't much he could do about it other than let his mind go through the motions.
"Let me think about it, I'll see if I can find a loophole…where's Franny?" Lewis asked.
"Trying to convince Mildred to take custody over Wilbur, though so far Mildred seems pretty set on allowing Wilbur to leave the state. She says he'll be safer there. Tsk, like the Bowler Hat Guy can't travel." Goob scowled.
"You didn't tell anyone about him, did you!?" Lewis asked urgently, looking warily over at the doctors, who were now talking to Bryan's grandmother.
Goob shook his head, "No, of course not, I stuck to the story. We were going to visit Wilbur because we didn't know visitor hours closed at night, and got caught up in the fire. Just a couple of dumb kids doing a stupid move. I still don't really understand why we aren't telling them about the Bowler Hat Guy though…"
"We have no proof, none whatsoever." Lewis explained, thinking with dread over what would have happened had they spilled their guts; he could just imagine psychiatrists and Mildred's tearful face, and one cop who would no doubt look suspiciously at them and ask, have you bought any gasoline lately… "We'll sound as crazy as Wilbur does on a regular basis. Look, I'm going back to my room, I'm really tired."
"Don't you want to say something to Wilbur? He's really freaked out," Goob pointed out. He was right, Wilbur looked strung out and dazed, like he was half asleep, staring out intensely into empty space. He probably could use a comforting word…
'If I help him…' Lewis shook his head, heading out, "No, just tell him I'm still asleep. I'll…I'll think of something."
He ignored the look of suspicion on Goob's face and headed back to his room. He really had no clue what he was going to do, his body hurt all over, and he wanted to go back to sleep. He'd figure out their next step when he woke up. Until then, he wasn't going to think about it.
'…you'll lose it.'
'Lose what?'
No answer. He went to his room to sleep.
2
That night, probably because of his earlier thoughts, Lewis had a bad dream about Wonderland.
He dreamt he was running through a field, chasing something. At first he thought he was chasing a white rabbit, one that bounded in great speed ahead of him. But the more he ran, the more he saw it was actually a girl, and he wasn't chasing, he was following. She was showing him the way to Wonderland.
Though Lewis hadn't seen it from a distance, eventually they ran up to a great wall of fire, one that rose so high that he couldn't see the clear blue sky anymore. The girl looked over at Lewis, and though Lewis had to stay far back, away from the shearing heat of the flame and the cloud of the smoke, the girl seemed entirely undisturbed by both as she pointed at the flame, and said "It's this way. You have to go this way."
Lewis took a step back and shook his head, "You're lying. I want to go to Wonderland. That's not the way to Wonderland."
The girl looked at him curiously, and asked, "Why do you want to go to Wonderland?"
Lewis had no idea why he wanted to go to Wonderland, but the first thing that came to mind popped out of his mouth, "I need to understand something."
The girl smiled and nodded, "I wanted nonsense, so I went through a rabbit hole. I wanted order, so I went through a looking glass. If you want understanding, this is the way you have to go." She explained, pointing to the flames.
Lewis looked at the towering wall of fire and shook, "But it'll burn me! It'll hurt!"
The girl nodded sadly. "Yes." She agreed, "It will.
Lewis looked up at the wall, before looking back at the girl to protest some more, but she was gone. It was only him and the fire.
Lewis wanted to back to the field. It was boring there, but it was nice and predictable and, most importantly, safe. In an empty field, there are no flames to hurt you, or to bind you, or to cage you. There was no risk in the field at all.
…but there was no knowledge there as well, no understanding. And Lewis needed the understanding. So even though he was terrified, even though he wanted nothing more than to run and hide, Lewis closed his eyes, held his breath, and instead, ran into the flames.
3
Lewis was in water.
He remembered running into the flames, knew it had engulfed his small body, but there he was, whole and unhurt, floating in the water. An ocean, judging by its salty taste. Off in the distance, he heard thunder, great, big booms of it. It sounded like a baby sobbing.
Eventually his body drifted toward a beach, and as Lewis was dragging himself to shore, strong hands suddenly lifted him up, and helped him onto the beach. Once he was safely on the sand, he looked up to thank his rescuer, only to see the oddest looking bird he had ever come across; it was shaped like a dodo bird, a long instinct species, but was twice as tall himself, had the coloring of a crow, and somehow managed to smile at him warmly with a hardened beak as it asked kindly, "You okay, honey?"
Lewis started to nod, before a thought came to him, and he quickly asked, "Do you know?!"
The Dodo bird frowned, "Do I know what? You have to give a question, if you want to know something."
Lewis had been afraid of that. He didn't know what he needed to know, only that he could only learn it here, through the flames, into Wonderland. He didn't have a question.
He opened up to tell the Dodo this, but instead heard himself say, "What happened between the mouse and the fury?"
"Ah," the Dodo nodded, "That's a long, sad story, but I shall give you the short version. The fury tried to unjustly execute the mouse, but the mouse fought back. Their fight resulted in the house burning down, and they were both left injured, homeless, and needlessly feuded for the rest of their days."
Lewis raised an eyebrow, "And the moral of that is?"
The Dodo sighed as more thunder sobbed in the distance, "Morals. Everyone always wants morals. The Dutchess would say that the moral is, don't fight inside the house, but the Dutchess has always had a sort of over-simplified way of looking at life." the Dodo then looked Lewis seriously in the eye, and said quietly, "I think it means, choose your battles wisely. Is he worth it?"
"Who?" Lewis asked, but the Dodo and the beach were both gone, and all around him was forest.
"Who, who?" A voice said from above him, and Lewis looked up sharply to see, not an owl, but a cat. A blond cat with tired eye and a lazy smile.
"What?" Lewis asked, watching in fascination as he realized that many part of the cat, from its tail to its legs to its head kept fading in and out, actively and apparently randomly. As far as Lewis could tell, the cat didn't seem to have any control over which part of it disappeared at which time, for it took a long while for the Cat's mouth to come back.
When it did, the cat replied, "Who is it you are talking about? Come on, dude, you can tell me."
It seemed odd to hear a cat use a word like 'dude', even odder then to have it grinning and talking and fading in and out in such a dizzying fashion, and Lewis replied defensively, "Well, who are you?"
The cat's grin seemed to grow wider as it chuckled, "I'm your sorry excuse for a guide. I'm here to tell you which way you need to go to find him. It's the only thing I'm good for." The cat finished sadly, looking down at its see-through body, which was quickly become altogether invisible, "I'm not quite all here, as you can see."
"Yes, and I'm sorry for that, but who are you talking about?" Lewis demanded.
"That's what I asked," the Cat pointed out good-naturedly.
Lewis shook his head in fury, before remembering his quest. Finally, he asked, "Do you know?"
"Know what?" The Cat asked, its eyes fading away. Lewis wondered if it could still see him.
Lewis couldn't explain that he didn't know the question, so instead asked, "What happened to the Dutchesse's child?"
"Ah," the cat nodded, "The Dutchess went mad when the child was born, and decided it was a pig. She has been trying to catch it and eat it ever since. She thinks it will make a very nice stew."
"That's terrible!" Lewis cried, looking around the forest as if he might spot the Dutchess and the baby in their chase that very minute, "Where is it? I have to find the baby!"
"Why?" The cat asked curiously, though by now most of its head was gone, and all that was left were its ears and a smile.
Lewis still looked at the Cat in bewilderment, "Because…because it'll be murder to leave it behind! Please, you said you'd tell me where to go! Where is the baby!?"
Now there was only a smile left, and as it faded away, the cat said, "Up ahead, there are two paths. One leads to the Dutchess's house, the other to the home of the March Hare. To find what you're looking for, go to the Hare's house. In both ways lies madness."
"But I don't want to be amongst mad people!" Lewis protested.
Even though the smile was gone, a faded, distant voice called back, "Some would call it mad to jump through a wall of fire, you know. Even for someone you care about. Is he worth it?" And then it was gone.
Lewis walked down the path, and saw the sign that pointed in two directions, one to the Dutchess's house, the other to the Hare's house. He wondered, if he was looking for the baby, why not just go to its home. But the cat had said very specifically that he needed to go to the Hare's house to find what he was looking for.
Slowly, carefully, he walked down the path towards the Hare's house; the trees were getting sparser, and there seemed to be a more comfortable, yellow glow around the place. He felt immediately more at ease, and when he saw a house in the distance he immediately headed in that direction.
He heard music and went around the side of the house into the backyard, where he saw two people playing baseball, only instead of balls it was with plates and teacups. As Lewis walked up to them he had to duck and jump away from flying shards of glass, and couldn't understand for the life of him why the two weren't covered in cuts.
"Hey…hey!" he shouted, and finally the two noticed him.
"You can't play," the March Hare said, straightening her skirt, "The Dormouse went home, so it would be uneven teams."
"Besides, it's rude to butt in during the middle of a game, ya know," The Hatter sneered, resting the bat onto his shoulder. It was only when the bat started fluttering its wings that Lewis noticed there was something not quite right going on. He decided not to comment.
"I don't want to play, I'm just looking for something right now. I was hoping you two could help." Lewis explained, stepping between the numerous broken tea cups and chinaware. He wanted to ask if they knew where the Dutchess's baby was, but instead popped out, "Why is a raven like a writing desk?"
There was a long moment of silence as the two looked at him, their expression suitable for someone who has just grown some new, snarling second head, before the Hatter simply asked, "What?"
"Um, why is a raven like a writing desk…there's an answer, isn't there?" Lewis tried again, feeling oddly sheepish, "Maybe…I don't know, something about Poe…maybe?"
"Ugh, I get it," the Hatter rolled his eyes, shifting to support his left leg, "You're one of those 'answer' people."
"Can't stand leaving a riddle unsolved," the Hare tsked, "Will drive you right mad…well, madder, by the look of you."
Lewis couldn't help but feel insulted under their patronizing gaze, "There's always an answer," Lewis insisted, "Why shouldn't I look for it?"
The Hatter and the Hare exchanged a knowing look before the Hatter explained, almost kindly, "Look Chief, we understand that, and yeah, everything does have an answer…but you're not going to find every answer, no matter how much of a genius you are. Sometimes, you're going to have to choose which question you really want the answer too."
"For example," the Hare continued, "Do you want to know why a raven is like a writing desk…or do you want to know where the Queen is?"
"Queen?" Lewis sputtered, now just completely lost, "…no, I mean, I'm looking for a-"
"We know what you're looking for, Lewis," the Hatter interrupted, and this time there was definitely a trace of sympathy in his voice as he continued, "but you can't have it both ways, there just isn't enough of you. You're going to have to choose which riddle you're going to solve, and which one will remain a mystery."
"I…I don't understand. What are you talking about?" Lewis could hear the begging tone in his own voice, but didn't care. Everyone here knew something he didn't, and he was sick and tired of it.
Again, the Hatter and Hare looked at each other, and the Hare sighed and the Hatter shrugged, and then they both pointed at a path that led into the woods and said together, "What you're looking for is that way." And then, like everyone he had met before, they were both gone.
4
"Shoot…shoot…frick!"
Lewis had been traveling down the path for awhile now, and looked up warily to hear a soft voice curse in the distance. Further down the path at a turning corner, he saw a white rabbit, the one he had seen in the beginning of his dream, wearing a white lab coat and staring miserably at its wristwatch.
"Late! I'm totally late! Frickety-frick-frick!" The rabbit cursed before bouncing away.
"H-hey! Wait a minute!" Lewis called, hoping the rabbit might give him directions, as he was beginning to worry he was lost. But the rabbit, either ignoring him or having not heard him, continued running, and frustrated with being left behind, Lewis chased after it.
"Oh man, she's going to totally have my head!" he heard the Rabbit whine, and as he turned the corner to follow it, he was stunned to see a great, huge castle just right in front of him. It was beautiful, all soft edges and soft colors, and for a second he was reminded of Wilbur's ramblings about the future, and thought that this was perhaps the kind of place Wilbur imagined when he spoke of it. Still running but not paying attention to his feet, his toes hit roughly a rock, and he sprawled onto the ground with a yell.
"Ugh…" Lewis groaned, grasping his knee which had hit the ground dead center. Above him, a voice said sternly, "Don't you move now. Let me see."
He looked up to see the white rabbit inspecting his knee, an annoyed look on its furry little face, "Great. You've gone and scrapped it. I'm very late you know, I shouldn't be messing about with you," the Rabbit informed him, but she took out her first aid kit as she said it anyway, and quickly began to care for the knee. As she did it, the Rabbit asked, "What were you chasing me for anyway? Can't you see I'm running late?"
"I didn't mean to delay you." Lewis apologized weakly, wincing as the rabbit covered his cut in alcohol, "I was trying to get directions to…well, here, I guess. I'm assuming the Queen lives here." Lewis gestured to the castle.
"Of course she lives here, only place fitting for a Queen now, isn't it. Hold still, I just have to bandage it. Then I really must be on my way." The Rabbit informed him, taking out a white strip of cloth to tie around the wound.
"Sorry," Lewis apologized again, "What am I making you late for?"
At least, that's what he meant to say. What really came out was, "Who stole the Queen's tarts?"
The Rabbit rolled her eyes, "Ugh, you heard about that did you? I swear, you try to set up a secret trial, and pretty soon the whole kingdom knows about it. That's what you're making me late for, ya know. They caught the Knave of Hearts, and I must be there to read out his sentencing. Poor bastard…" the Rabbit looked around suspiciously, before leaning over to Lewis to whisper, "Can you keep a secret?"
Lewis nodded.
The Rabbit looked around again, just to be sure, before whispering, "Well, between you and me, I happen to know for a fact that the Knave is innocent, and that those tarts weren't stolen at all. The Queen gave those tarts away. To the Dodo Bird, if you can imagine! The scandal." The Rabbit shook her head in dismay, "but the Queen didn't want anyone to know, so now the poor Knave is going to be punished, probably beheaded. I'll of course try to get his sentence reduced, but…" the Rabbit shrugged a 'what can you do' shrug.
"That's terrible. Oh, thank you." Lewis thanked the Rabbit, who had just finished tending to his wound, "Well, can't you prove the Knave's innocent?"
The Rabbit gapped at him, "What?! And get my head chopped off for treason?! No, no, no, what the Queen wants, the Queen gets. By the way, the Queen wants to see you." The Rabbit mentioned almost as an afterthought as she put her tools away.
Lewis raised an eyebrow, "Me? What does she want with me?"
"Everyone's heard about you going off to find the Dutchess's baby, ya know. Probably wants to talk to you about that. Her chambers are that way, and don't delay. The Queen hates tardiness…"The Rabbit froze, than looked at her watch before shouting, "Frick! I'm late, I'm late!" before bouncing off in the opposite direction.
And then, because Lewis really couldn't help himself, he muttered, "Curioser and curioser."
Picking himself up and brushing himself off, Lewis headed in the direction the Rabbit had pointed him in. He made his way into a grand courtyard, which was full of hedges cut into the shapes of cute animals, perfect hearts and…DNA strands?
"It's beautiful, isn't it?" A woman, deep and sultry, said from behind him. Lewis whirred around at the voice, was about to say 'yes it is', and gasped.
Before him were two great thrones. On one throne was a woman, so clearly the Queen at first sight that Lewis's first instinct was to bow. On the other throne though…
"My memory scanner!" Lewis cried, staring at the shimmer machine which, due to the reflection, seemed to stare back at him, "What is that doing here?!"
"It is King," the Queen informed him, "I am Queen…and you, young man…are you Lewis?" the Queen asked, staring at him with deep, brown eyes.
This time Lewis really did bow, an awkward, quick thing as he replied, "Yes, your highness. The white rabbit said you wanted to speak to me about the Dutchess's baby. Do you know where it is?"
The Queen nodded, "Yes, my little tart, I do…but that is not why I called you here, despite what the white rabbit may think. Lewis, the reason I have called you here…" the Queen smiled, a warm, dazzling smile that made Lewis's insides melt, "…is because I want to make you prince of this kingdom."
Lewis blinked, absorbing this information before a small smile came to his face as he asked, unbelieving, "…me? You want to make me prince? You…you want me?"
The Queen nodded again, the smile still there, "Yes, my little tart, of course I want you. Oh, how I have missed you. Come, sit by me," she gestured beside her, and out of the ground, right between her and the memory scanner, "and together we shall rule this kingdom…Queen and Prince."
Lewis was full out grinning now, and he took a step towards the throne…and froze.
"You're highness," Lewis said after a moment, wishing he could just shut up, wishing he could just sit down, but he had to ask, "What about the Dutchess's baby?"
For a moment, the Queen's face seemed to harden, the smile seemed cold, but just as quickly it was back to normal as she asked, softly, "What of it? It is the Dutchess's child. She shall take care of it."
"I've heard she wants to kill and eat it, my Queen," Lewis explained, wanting so badly to sit, so badly, "If you'll wait…I can go get it, and bring it back…we could all be a family…"
This time the Queen's face did go cold, the smile slipping away, "No, Lewis. I cannot have two princes. It would bring anarchy and division to the kingdom. Come, sit. The Dutchess can take care of her own child, and we…"the Queen smiled, "We shall be a family, my little tart."
Lewis looked at the Queen, with her soft blond hair and her loving, regretful eyes. He looked at his memory scanner, which shimmered brilliantly, but lifelessly. And then he looked at the throne meant for him, and said softly, "I understand what the question is now."
"Oh?" The Queen said, looking down at him from upon her great throne, so close and yet so terribly far away, "and what's that?"
Lewis looked at the Queen, who he had been looking for, for so long, and explained, mostly to himself then anyone, "I have to choose, don't I? Between you and the Dutchess's baby. I can't do both. I could have found you, I could have talked to you, and loved you; you might have even taken me back." Lewis said thoughtfully, hearing thunder in the distance, thunder that sounded like crying, "But to do that would mean leaving the baby behind. I can't do both, I can't start a relationship with you, and take care of him at the same time. If I tried to do both, neither would work. I have to choose between you. That's why I've been so upset, so afraid, so confused. A part of me knew this the whole time. I have to choose…"
Thunder in the air, the smell of a distant storm, and somewhere a wall of fire roared. These things all seemed so far away in the garden though…
The Queen nodded, "Yes, you can't have us both. If you go save the child, you give me up, you put me aside. Me, this garden of hearts, the kingdom, everything you ever hoped you would have. So Lewis, I must ask…is he worth it?"
'I want to stay!' Lewis wanted to cry, wanted to scream at the top of his lungs, 'I want to stay here, with you! I don't want to hurt anymore, I don't want to be confused anymore, I want you to take care of me, please! Please don't let me leave!'
Lewis wanted to say this, wanted to say it badly, but for some reason couldn't bring himself to do it. He was just about to ask why this was, when the girl said, "You've asked many questions, Lewis, so how about you answer one."
To Lewis's surprise, the Queen had been replaced by the girl who had shown the way to Wonderland. It was she who now sat on the throne, and it was on her head that the crown sat. "What happened to the Queen!?" Lewis demanded.
"No, no, no," the girl tsked, "it's my turn now. Tell me Lewis: at the end of my last book, I was a Queen of this land. I had worked long and hard for that position, but in the end I gave it up and went home. Why did I do that? Why did I leave, when I had finally had all I had ever wanted?"
Lewis gapped at her, trying to remember the book, but all he could recall was that her celebration party had gone bad. What had been the reason… "I don't know. Why did you give up the kingdom?"
Alice smiled, "Because, 'Cornelius', the dreams we have as children are often things of nonsense, and if every dream we ever had really did come true, we'd be sick of it in a moment. And, I'm sorry to say, that's all this kingdom, and the queen, is. A childhood dream."
This did not sit well with Lewis at all, and again he heard that crying thunder, and he shouted over it, "So, what, this is a dream, but the damn baby isn't!? Why is the thunder real, but this place is not? Why can't I give up Wilbur for my mom!?"
"Because the mother you love is imaginary, someone you created out of wishes and dreams and one very brief memory, which you stole out of your own head," Alice explained sadly, "While the thunder is actually happening."
Another blast of thunder, another gentle sob. Lewis could hear his name in the wind. "What do you mean, the thunder is real?"
"Who will it be, Lewis?" Alice demanded, "You must decide now, there's no time left! Stay in the field or run through the fire? Bow to the Queen or save the baby? Live in Wonderland or go home to the storm?! Decide, Lewis!"
"I!...I!.." Lewis blinked and saw the wall of fire, roaring and spitting and burning, and behind him was a beautiful garden full of flowers singing and the Queen standing and saying, "Decide, Lewis, decide!" and it was in all of that madness that Lewis looked into the flames, and saw, just faintly, in the distance behind the flames, a frumpy woman shaking a screaming baby, murmuring, "Speak roughly to your little boy, and beat him when he sneezes…"
And then he could see through the flame clearly, and though the cruel Dutchess was still just a shadow, he could see clearly the little baby. It didn't look like a pig. It looked like the most beautiful, precious thing Lewis had ever seen, and taking one look into that child's tear-stained, frightened face, Lewis knew that the whole time, there was only one choice he could have ever made.
"I'm coming, Wilbur!" Lewis screamed, and ran into the flames.
5
Lewis woke up, an odd dream he had been having quickly slipping like sand through fingers out of his mind, and he looked up to see Wilbur's frightened, tear-stained face looking down at him.
"I saw Carl, Lewis!" Wilbur sobbed, clutching at the younger boys shoulder, "He said mom's going to die!"
Outside, a storm thundered.
?
Speak roughly to your little boy,
and beat him when he sneezes.
He only does it to annoy,
Because he knows it teases.
Speak roughly to the little
Boy,
And beat him,
Beat him,
Roughly.
Beat him roughly!
Kill the child!
Thief of time!
-tbc-