Enjoy!
Disclaimer - I own nothing here, sadly.
White Rabbit (Logan)
"Oh man, that King is sure to have my ears and tail on his dinner plate tonight! I have to make it on time!" I pulled out my pocket watch and checked the time. It was still the same time it was when I was at the Hatter's place. Terrible, just awful.
Well, I could have just sat there and let time waste away by blaming it on that handsome Alice, but there wasn't enough light in the day! I scurried closer and closer to the courtroom, ready to be on the jury at the hearing of the King's unknown topic.
When I drew nearer, the guards at the gate saw me and opened the heavy steel doors, moving out of my way as they did. I scrambled in through the doors, only glancing around the wide room that opened into the courtroom chamber. My tail and ears twitched as I found my place in the jury, all of us along one side of the room. I could see the red King getting ready for the hearing behind the podium, his assistant helping him calm down, as he was obviously furious about something. Most likely what the case was about.
I sat down, finally breathing. Looking around, I saw the red decorations scattered around the large room. A bright chandelier with dangling red crystals let light, flowery light dance across the room as the sunlight hit it and flew in all directions. The carpet, a deep blood velvet, was smooth, and spotless. The throne, made of gold and covered in actual red velvet and silk looked absolutely delightful to park my tail on!
Feeling around with my paws on the table in front of me, I grabbed the board and the quill and wrote down my name. These court hearings usually lasted so long that all of the jury, including me, forgot our names oftentime by the end.
I could finally see Alice, my handsome, devilishly charming blonde Alice walk into the courtroom. He was accompanied by that Gryphon, the lucky old bastard. Alice will be mine!
-o.O.o-
Kendall
We got to the courthouse after all that yelling and talk about a trial beginning for something I had no clue about. I only hoped that I wasn't somehow dragged into it, said to be involved.
The Gryphon led me in, directing me and telling me where to go. We sat down on one of the benches soon enough as we waited for the trial to start. I saw, up at the front in chains, the assistant of the king. His eyes were pointed down at the ground, refusing to look up and let people see them. I kind of felt bad looking at him. I didn't think he'd be the type of person to commit a crime. Although, everything in this place was wonky. Not too much surprised me anymore.
Movement out of the corner of my eye caught my attention. I looked toward it and saw what must have been the Jury. Several desks were all lined up against the right side of the room, all but one were occupied by different animals, different species, each unique. They each had a chalkboard of sorts in front of them, with a writing tool on the side of the boards.
All of them sat down, each gathering themselves before eventually taking their writing utensil and their board and writing something down. I leaned over toward the Gryphon, whispering, "What are they doing?"
He looked at me, then at the Jury, then back at me. "They're writing their names down. These court cases usually last a very long time, long enough for them to forget their names. It's a precaution of sort, so that they know who they are."
"Well… that seems sort of stupid. Even if this trial lasted a week, how could they forget their own na-" I was interrupted.
"Silence in the court!" yelled the White Rabbit. At this, the whole courtroom went deadly silent, save for the scratching of feathers on boards. I could see all of the jurors writing down what I had said about them writing down their names and how it was stupid. I tried not to chuckle as one asked another how to spell 'stupid.'
The King looked around, craning his neck, looking for whoever was talking, so he could call them out.
I looked back at the Jury, hearing a loud squeeeak noise coming from one of the jurors' quills. I located the perpetrator and quickly went up behind him. He was so focused on writing that he didn't even see me, and was completely surprised when I took the quill out of his hand. It was Juror Bill, the lizard, I found out as I read from his board.
"Excuse me?" he asked, disbelieving.
"Hi there. Um, your quill scratching and squeaking on this board here was getting on my nerves. I'm confiscating it until you can figure out how to write without making so much noise." I explained.
"Oh well, it can't be helped," the lizard said before pulling his tail from underneath his body (put there to keep it safe when he was sitting in the chair) and placing it on the board, immediately beginning to continue writing with it. A single mark wasn't made. I sighed.
Making my way back to sit next to the Gryphon, the White Rabbit from earlier caught my eye. He was part of the Jury! I diverted my eyes from his, sitting down and looking at the ground until a bell rung from off in the distance, and the King stood up.
"Rabbit!" he called. The White Rabbit scrambled not-so-gracefully out of his seat and stood at nervous attention in his spot. "Read the accusation!"
"Y-y-y-yes your Highness!" he said. The Rabbit stuck his head under his table, then popped back up with a long, medieval looking trumpet. He blew three long notes, and put it back down. This time, he came back up with a beige-looking parchment scroll.
"Ahem!" he cleared his throat. "The King, Lord Carlos, has made some tarts to enjoy. Two days later, his tarts went missing! Oh my! He says he told no one except for his assistant, here, in chains at the front, and that he didn't even get a chance to eat any of the tarts. This case has been called to court, as the King wishes to accuse his assistant of stealing his beloved tarts."
Sitting back down, the King said, "Jury, consider your final verdict."
The White Rabbit dropped the scroll at his feet, not even bothering to pick it up. "Sir! We have to actually discuss the case and review the evidence before we do anything, not to mention calling up witnesses."
"Fine, whatever. Just...call your first witness." the King said, tiredly.
The Rabbit picked up his horn again and blew it for some odd reason. "I call the first witness to the stand," he said.
The whole room was silent. The scratching of the quills was even gone.
"Ahem. I call the first witness to the stand," he said a little more forcefully.
There was more silence, before a snore, and a thud. A few seconds later, I saw a sleepy Mad Hatter walk up to the podium and plop down right before promptly leaning back and falling asleep in the chair.
"Psst!" a small voice peeped. I could see the small Dormouse crawling out from underneath his hat, pulling on his hair and pinching his nose, trying to get him to wake up.
"Eh?! What?" The Hatter woke up, his hat flying off of his head as he looked around frantically, wondering why his slumber had been interrupted. His long, wavy brown hair was exposed for me to see. I laughed quietly at the look of bewilderment on his face.
"You're in court, you rude imbecil! You've been called to stand. Sit up straight! Grab your hat! Speak! Give me this!" the Dormouse squeaked, pushing and pulling at the Hatter to make him sort of presentable. The mouse had went into his pocket and pulled out a sandwich, a kettle, a gravy boat, a sugar container, and a teacup. How'd all of that even fit in the-
Nevermind.
The Hatter listened for the most part and composed himself a little bit before beginning to speak. "...ON THE FOURTEENTH OF MARCH," he introduced very, very grandly, "I think that's when all of this junk happened. I'm tired. Dormouse, may I leave?"
"It was the fifteenth," chirped the March Hare from somewhere behind me.
"Sixteenth," squeaked the Dormouse, who had crawled into the now-empty pocket of the Hatter's over-coat vest.
"Write all of this down," the King said to the Jury, pointing at their half-empty boards. They all jumped into action, squeaking away with their annoying quills. Juror Bill did his best to "write" with his tail.
"Take off that hat!" Carlos boomed.
"It's not mine," the Hatter replied.
"So it's stolen."
"No. I make them all. They're only for sale. I make none to keep for my own. I am a Hatter after all."
"So...why can't you take it off?"
"Because, your Majesty, it is simply not made to be."
"Uh...okay. Moving along, would you please present your evidence to me so we can all move along? I have to go watch the sunset, and right after that, there's a human chess match in the courtyard. Snap snap, make it quick."
Right then, I had felt something weird start to happen. I felt the Dormouse crawl up onto my arm. I didn't even notice it slipping out of the Hatter's pocket.
"What's wrong with you?"
"Me?" I responded. "Nothing's wrong with me."
"Of course there is. You have absolutely no right to grow here. And at such a rapid pace too."
"That's stupid. You're growing. Everyone else in here is too," I added, looking around the hall for added effect.
"Whatever," the Dormouse said before getting up and trotting back over to the Hatter to stay in his pocket for the rest of the hearing. Up at the podium, the King had gone back to arguing with the Hatter about having his ridiculous hat on.
"UGH!" grunted Carlos. "Can we please just talk about this and move on?
"Right. As you know, sir, I'm a very poor, poor man. I've been sitting here, trying to drink my tea for the past few millennia, and then, my sandwiches started getting thinner and thinner about a week ago. How I miss my twinkling tea," explained the Hatter, making absolutely no sense at all.
"...Twinkling starts with a T. How can you miss a T if it's right there in the word?" asked the King.
"My tea," said the Hatter.
"So you take me for a fool, is that what you're getting at here?" Carlos asked disbelievingly.
"No, no, absolutely not."
"Then keep going. You're beginning to annoy me…"
"As I was saying, I'm a very poor man, and after the March Hare had told me that-" the Hatter was cut off.
"I didn't tell you anything!" the Hare shouted from somewhere in the audience.
"Yes, you did! Don't lie!" snapped the Mad Hatter.
"I did not!"
"AHEM!" the King grunted. "He says he didn't say anything, so drop it and move on please. This is becoming redundant."
"Anyways, since the Hare says he didn't say anything, the Dormouse had said," he paused, looking around for the Dormouse to make sure he wasn't interrupted again. After a moment of silence, he continued, "After what the Dormouse said, I went to go pour myself some wonderful tasting tea."
"What? Who cares about your tea, Hatter? What did the mouse say?" one of the animals on the Jury asked.
"Huh? Oh. I can't seem to recall. Oh well, let's move on-"
"Hatter!" yelled the King.
"Yes, your Majesty?" the Hatter replied meekly, scared of getting yelled at again.
"Can you please get to the point here?" he sighed.
By now, the Hatter had began groveling on the floor, sliding out of his seat to prop himself on one knee of the lush, red, carpeted floor. "I'm a very poor man, your Highness-"
"You're also a very poor storyteller," muttered King Carlos.
One of the members of the audience, a small, furry, adorable little pig, must have liked what the King said, for he cheered when it was quiet.
The King snapped his fingers, and three armed card guards came in, ready for a fight. They all got in their defensive positions before one of them stepped forward and pulled out a bag with a string tied around the lip. It loosened the string and opened the bag as one of the other guards grabbed the pig and shoved it in the bag. All three stepped back into place and returned behind the scenes silently.
My eyes widened. "But…" I whispered, "It was so cute…"
After the little pig was taken away, Carlos went on, wiping a small, but visible bead of sweat from his dark eyebrows. "Now, if you're done, go sit down back in the audience."
"Well, you see, I can't really do that."
The King sighed, placing his head in his hand and shaking it, as if he were willing an oncoming headache to go away. "And why is that?"
"Because I can't really sit right now. I'm on the floor."
"Can someone execute this man? His stupidity is really itching my nerves."
The Hatter yelped. "But I need to finish my tea! Please don't have someone execute me."
"Ugh. Fine, just get out of my sight. I don't want to have to deal with your idiocy for another century or two."
The Hatter jumped up and scurried toward the exit.
"Can someone execute him outside please?" the King added for good measure.
An officer next to the King had started to run for the Hatter, but the Hatter was already out the door before the officer could even take his first step.
The officer sat back down and Carlos began the trial again. "Can the next witness go up there? Like, take the stand before I feel like having everyone in this room executed, just so I can have my tarts."
The next mad person to take the stand was the cook from earlier, the one who reminded me of Chef from the Muppets. She carried her pepper thing with her, and everyone she walked past began to sneeze violently. The sneezing died away a few moments after she took a seat in the same chair that the Hatter was in only moments ago.
"Okay, cook. Give me your evidence to help my assistant get out of his chains," Carlos demanded.
"I can't," said the cook.
"Your Majesty?" a small voice came from beside the King. He looked over to find the White Rabbit at his side. "I believe you must examine this witness thoroughly."
"Hmm. Perhaps you are right." He turned his head back to the witness stand. "Cook!" he boomed. The cook jumped out of her chair for a moment before composing herself once more and settling back down.
"What are tarts made out of?" he asked.
"Pepper, mostly," responded the cook.
"Treacle," a sleepy Dormouse said from behind her.
The entire court suddenly went into a rushed panic. "Someone put a collar on that Dormouse!" shouted the King. Similar yells and protests raised out of the crowd's frenzy. I was so confused. I didn't know what was happening.
Leaning over to the Gryphon, I asked, "What's going on?"
"The King was testing the cook, asking her what tarts were made out of. The answer was treacle, a substance almost like molasses, but since she answered pepper, her answer was wrong, and therefore, she should have been beheaded, until the mouse answered for her the correct answer." The Gryphon explained, but then turned his attention back to the chaos.
"I understood absolutely none of that, but alright."
After a few minutes, everyone started to settle down, and I noticed that the cook was no longer at the stand. She must have slipped away in all of the confusion.
"She's gone!" the King yelled, surprised. "Oh well. Call the next witness!"
I watched as the cute White Rabbit pored over his list, seeing who the next witness would be.
I was surprised when his voice squeaked out the next name at the top of his lungs.
"Alice!"
I'm so sorry for the long wait! High school is catching up with me, for real. But I also lost my phone, and I've been spending all of my time on this computer and I decided to sit down and finish this chapter. It's taken me three hours of sitting here to write and edit, but it's totally worth it. For those of you still reading, you all are awesome! And there's only a chapter or two left until this story is over… :( But thank you all for reading, and tell me what you thought of the chapter!
